Jul 2026· Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference Companion· pp. 1595-1600· 0 citations· 11 references
TL;DR
Experimental results on benchmark graph datasets show that SA-DCGP discovers compact and high-performing architectures while significantly reducing computational overhead, demonstrating the effectiveness of surrogate-assisted evolutionary search for graph-based representation learning.
Abstract
Neural Architecture Search (NAS) aims to automate the design of neural network architectures, reducing the need for manual expert-driven engineering. Evolutionary approaches, such as Cartesian Genetic Programming (CGP), provide a flexible graph-based representation for evolving neural structures but suffer from high computational costs due to expensive fitness evaluations. In this paper, we propose a Surrogate-Assisted Dynamic Cartesian Genetic Programming (SA-DCGP) framework for automated neural architecture design in graph clustering tasks. The framework evolves architectures composed of FastKAN-based nonlinear blocks and SGCC-style linear normalized layers using dynamic mutation and multiple crossover operators. To reduce evaluation cost, we introduce a pair-wise surrogate model that predicts whether an offspring architecture will outperform its parent based on genotype-derived features and cheap training signals. The surrogate guides selection, enabling full training only for promising candidates. We employ a two-stage evaluation protocol with a cheap training phase for surrogate feature extraction and a full training phase for selected architectures. Clustering performance is evaluated using Accuracy, NMI, ARI, and F1 scores. Experimental results on benchmark graph datasets show that SA-DCGP discovers compact and high-performing architectures while significantly reducing computational overhead, demonstrating the effectiveness of surrogate-assisted evolutionary search for graph-based representation learning.
A pairwise surrogate model is introduced that predicts whether an offspring architecture is likely to outperform its parent using genotype-derived features and early training signals, enabling full evaluation only for promising candidates within the evolutionary loop.
Maciej Krzywda, Szymon Łukasik, Amir H. Gandomi· Proceedings of the Genetic a...· 0 citations
Evolutionary program search guided by Large Language Models (LLMs) has emerged as a powerful paradigm for automated scientific discovery. However, current approaches are fundamentally constrained by three bottlenecks: structurally blind parent selection, sparse whole-program evaluation rewards, and static mutation operators that fail to adapt during search. We present GAE (Graph-Augmented Evolution), a framework that resolves these limitations through a tightly coupled, three-pillar architecture. First, a relational graph neural network (GNN) parses programs into typed computation graphs, producing structure-aware embeddings. Second, an RL-optimized meta-controller leverages these embeddings to replace blind evolutionary sampling with a directed policy, dynamically selecting optimal parents and mutation directions based on reward history. Third, an online GRPO fine-tuning loop continuously updates the LLM mutation operator at test-time using group-normalized evaluation rewards, directly aligning the model's generation distribution with high-fitness structural edits. We evaluate GAE on a challenging scientific discovery task: symbolic regression for complex nonlinear oscillator systems. By transforming stochastic search into a directed, self-improving trajectory, GAE efficiently discovers closed-form physical equations, consistently matching or outperforming static LLM-driven baselines and achieving state-of-the-art out-of-distribution performance.
Large Language Models (LLMs) are opening new directions for automated heuristic design (AHD), allowing evolutionary methods to create and enhance heuristics for constrained optimization problems (COPs). However, most existing approaches face the challenge of the exploration-exploitation balance, where the evolution needs to escape convergence to homogeneous populations and discover as large a heuristic landscape as possible. To address this challenge, we introduce Quality-Diversity Evolution (QDEvo), a multi-objective framework that integrates Quality-Diversity optimization with LLM-based AHD. At its core, QDEvo employs a semantic survival selection mechanism that clusters algorithms by functional similarity, then applies local Pareto competition. Evaluation on well-known COPs benchmarks and real-world problems shows that our method consistently outperforms the state-of-the-art baseline in both Hypervolume and Inverted Generational Distance metrics. These results facilitate further exploration of the algorithmic design space, while ensuring competitive solution quality and efficiency.
Nam Do Khanh, Nhat Nguyen Tran Minh, Dat Pham Vu Tuan et al.· Proceedings of the Genetic a...· 1 citation
Evolutionary algorithms are well suited to neural architecture search and other combinatorial design problems, but their scalability is often limited by the high cost of fitness evaluation. This paper studies evolutionary multi-objective optimisation in a regime where fitness evaluations are effectively free, enabled by a training-free proxy for neural network expressivity. We propose SWAP-Lite, a Pareto-guided evolutionary algorithm that maintains an explicit archive of non-dominated solutions over representational capacity and deployment cost, yielding an anytime optimiser that exposes budget-feasible solutions throughout the search. Using a MobileNet-style architecture space as a case study, we instantiate the fitness function with a sample-wise activation pattern proxy and perform large-scale evolutionary searches with up to 105 architecture evaluations. Experiments on CIFAR-10 and ImageNet show that SWAP-Lite discovers compact architectures that are competitive with state-of-the-art training-based and zero-shot baselines, while reducing search cost by one to four orders of magnitude. Analysis of the evolutionary dynamics demonstrates that explicit bi-objective optimisation produces higher-quality constrained Pareto fronts and superior anytime hypervolume compared with random search, greedy local search, and single-objective evolutionary baselines.
Jingyue Cong, Kai Wei, Yameng Peng et al.· Annual Conference on Genetic...· 0 citations
This work proposes a general LES framework that incorporates feature-assisted niche construction within abstract search spaces, enabling the seamless integration of niche-based search strategies from evolutionary computation and introduces PartEvo (Partition to Evolve), an LES method that combines niche collaborative search and advanced prompting strategies to improve algorithm discovery efficiency.
Qinglong Hu, Qingfu Zhang· Neural Information Processin...· 10 citations· ⚡3
A framework that combines large language models (LLMs) for problem understanding with a structured Biased Random-Key Genetic Algorithm (BRKGA) configurator for algorithm realization is presented, allowing users to describe optimization problems in natural language and receive executable GPU-accelerated GA implementations.
Harishjitu Seesandrn, M. Sodhi, Resit Sendag· Proceedings of the Genetic a...· 0 citations