Related papers: Natural Evolution Strategy for Unconstrained and I…
This paper proposes a natural evolution strategy (NES) for mixed-integer black-box optimization (MI-BBO) that appears in real-world problems such as hyperparameter optimization of machine learning and materials design. This problem is…
In this work, we propose a new variant of natural evolution strategies (NES) for high-dimensional black-box optimization problems. The proposed method, CR-FM-NES, extends a recently proposed state-of-the-art NES, Fast Moving Natural…
Natural Evolution Strategies (NES) is a promising framework for black-box continuous optimization problems. NES optimizes the parameters of a probability distribution based on the estimated natural gradient, and one of the key parameters…
This paper presents Natural Evolution Strategies (NES), a recent family of algorithms that constitute a more principled approach to black-box optimization than established evolutionary algorithms. NES maintains a parameterized distribution…
We present a novel algorithm -- convex natural evolutionary strategies (CoNES) -- for optimizing high-dimensional blackbox functions by leveraging tools from convex optimization and information geometry. CoNES is formulated as an…
Zeroth-order local optimisation algorithms are essential for solving real-valued black-box optimisation problems. Among these, Natural Evolution Strategies (NES) represent a prominent class, particularly well-suited for scenarios where…
We present a novel Natural Evolution Strategy (NES) variant, the Rank-One NES (R1-NES), which uses a low rank approximation of the search distribution covariance matrix. The algorithm allows computation of the natural gradient with cost…
The covariance matrix adaptation evolution strategy (CMA-ES) is a stochastic search algorithm using a multivariate normal distribution for continuous black-box optimization. In addition to strong empirical results, part of the CMA-ES can be…
Evolution Strategies such as CMA-ES (covariance matrix adaptation evolution strategy) and NES (natural evolution strategy) have been widely used in machine learning applications, where an objective function is optimized without using its…
Efficient Natural Evolution Strategies (eNES) is a novel alternative to conventional evolutionary algorithms, using the natural gradient to adapt the mutation distribution. Unlike previous methods based on natural gradients, eNES uses a…
Black-box optimization is primarily important for many compute-intensive applications, including reinforcement learning (RL), robot control, etc. This paper presents a novel theoretical framework for black-box optimization, in which our…
Natural evolutionary strategies (NES) are a family of gradient-free black-box optimization algorithms. This study illustrates their use for the optimization of randomly-initialized parametrized quantum circuits (PQCs) in the region of…
This work concerns the evolutionary approaches to distributed stochastic black-box optimization, in which each worker can individually solve an approximation of the problem with nature-inspired algorithms. We propose a distributed evolution…
Bilevel optimization is a field of significant theoretical and practical interest, yet solving such optimization problems remains challenging. Evolutionary methods have been employed to address these problems in the black-box setting;…
Solving multimodal optimization problems (MMOP) requires finding all optimal solutions, which is challenging in limited function evaluations. Although existing works strike the balance of exploration and exploitation through hand-crafted…
Natural evolution strategies are a class of approximate-gradient black-box optimizers that have been successfully used for continuous parameter spaces. In this paper, we derive NES algorithms for discrete parameter spaces and demonstrate…
Black-box coevolution in mixed-motive games is often undermined by opponent-drift non-stationarity and noisy rollouts, which distort progress signals and can induce cycling, Red-Queen dynamics, and detachment. We propose the \emph{Marker…
Consensus-based optimization (CBO) has established itself as an efficient gradient-free optimization scheme, with attractive mathematical properties, such as mean-field convergence results for non-convex loss functions. In this work, we…
Black box discrete optimization (BBDO) appears in wide range of engineering tasks. Evolutionary or other BBDO approaches have been applied, aiming at automating necessary tuning of system parameters, such as hyper parameter tuning of…
The covariance matrix adaptation evolution strategy (CMA-ES) is an efficient continuous black-box optimization method. The CMA-ES possesses many attractive features, including invariance properties and a well-tuned default hyperparameter…