Homepage of Carola Doerr (formerly Winzen)
- ERC Consolidator grant: Very much looking forward to starting the ERC project dynaBBO: Dynamic Selection and Configuration of Black-box Optimization Algorithms on October 1, 2024.
I am looking for motivated PhD students, PostDocs, and software engineers to join our journey. While I am preparing a dedicated website for dynaBBO, do not hesitate to reach out if you want to know more about the project. We will be designing mechanisms that allow us to switch between different black-box optimization approaches, with the goal to leverage their complementarity not only with respect to different problem types/instances but also with respect to different phases of the optimization process. We will study mathematical and Machine Learning aspects of this problem.
- Anand Subramanian has interviewed me for his subject to podcast, you can listen to us on youtube. Find all subject to episodes here
- On September 1, 2023, I have joined the scientific staff at the INS2I Computer Science institute of CNRS as scientific advisor ("déléguée scientifique"), now spending 40% of my work time for the institute and 60% for my own research.
- Since June 2023, Alantha Newman and I are chairing the Algorithms and Complexity (CoA) working group of the Informatics-Mathematics research group (GDR-IM)
- 2024 events that I have (co-)organized:
- L’optimisation : au cœur des défis des sciences informatiques, October 3 and 4, Paris. Program co-chair, with Jérôme Malick, Claudia D'Ambrosio, Edouard Pauwels, Alantha Newman
- Journée Industrielle du GDR ROD et RT Optimisation, October 2, Paris. Local chair
- AutoML 2024, September 9-12, Paris. Local chair
- at GECCO 2024, July 14-18, Melbourne and hybrid:
- at
EvoSTAR 2024, April 3-5, Aberystwyth, Wales, UK:
organizer of special session
Analysis of Evolutionary Computation Methods: Theory, Empirics, and Real-World Applications, together with
Thomas Bartz-Beielstein and
Christine Zarges
- Other 2024 events where you can find me:
- Séminaire Philippe Flajolet, February 8, Institut Henri Poincare (IHP), Paris, France
- COST action meeting, February 19-21, Krakow, Poland
- ROADEF 2024, March 4-7, Amiens, France (keynote on March 5)
- JNIM 2024, March 18-21, Grenboble, France (keynote on March 21)
- Lorentz Center workshop: BeMCO: Benchmarking in Multi-Criteria Optimisation, April 15-19, Leiden, The Netherlands
- Vers une supply chain alimentaire durable, May 2, Paris (keynote)
- COSEAL, May 21-23, Dresden, Germany
- Dagstuhl Seminar 24271: Theory of Randomized Optimization Heuristics , June 30-July 5, Wadern, Germany
- Dagstuhl Seminar 24282: Automated Machine Learning for Computational Mechanics , July 7-12, Wadern, Germany
- ESA 2024, September 2-4, Royal Holloway, UK (PC member of Engineering and Applications track, Track B)
- CoA days 2024, November 25-27, Institut Henri Poincare (IHP), Paris, France
- Very honored that I received a 2022 CNRS bronze medal for my work on black-box optimization.
Here is a short profile about my work, and here is one that is a bit longer, and here is a short video about our work (all in French, my French has improved since ;-) )
-
I am Associate Editor of
and on the Advisory Board of Springer's Natural Computing Series.
- I am a founding member of the Benchmarking Network, bringing together people with interest in benchmarking iterative optimization heuristics
- I am also advisory board member of the COSEAL network (focused on COnfiguration and SElection of ALgorithms).
- I support the Vietnam Polymath REU program (VPR) as advisory board member. Please consider supporting it by suggesting research projects and offering to mentor one of their highly motivated participants.
- Happy that our new Benchmarking, Benchmarks, Software, and Reproducibility (BBSR) track at GECCO received a healthy number of 21 submission in its first year. I am co-chairing this track with Arnaud Liefooghe
- Our work Using Automated Algorithm Configuration for Parameter Control, joint with Deyao Chen (student at St. Andrews, UK),
Maxim Buzdalov, and
Nguyen Dang, was runner-up for the best paper award of
FOGA 2023.
We use a benchmark with known optimal parameter control policies to analyze how well the automated algorithm configuration tool irace can approximate these policies. We introduce a cascading strategy to help irace find well-performing policies. We also discuss the idea of tunability of algorithms. Happy to discuss this work - so much left to be done :-)
- Our work Using Affine Combinations of BBOB Problems for Performance Assessment, joint with
Diederick Vermetten and
Furong Ye received the best paper award of the ENUM track at
GECCO 2023.
Inspired by
Dietrich and Mersmann, we introduce a new way of combining BBOB functions to obtain more diverse instances for comparing numerical black-box optimization algorithms. We expect this to be particularly useful for training automated approaches for per-instance algorithm selection, configuration, and design.
- Our work Theory-inspired Parameter Control Benchmarks for Dynamic Algorithm Configuration, joint with
André Biedenkapp,
Nguyen Dang,
Martin Krejca, and
Frank Hutter, received a best paper award at
GECCO 2022. We show that theory of evolutionary algorithms can help understand how well (or not) reinforcement learning approaches tackle parameter control.
- 2023 events that I have (co-)organized:
-
GDR IM,
meeting of the steering committee of the French research group for ``mathematical Computer Science", November 16 and 17, Paris (local chair)
-
CoA days 2023,
workshop of the French national Algorithms and Complexity research group, September 18-20, Paris
-
COSEAL 2023
workshop on COnfiguration and SElection of ALgorithms (and many related topics), March 6-8, Paris
- at
GECCO 2023, July 15-19, Lisbon, Portugal:
- at
EvoSTAR 2023:
organizer of special session
Analysis of Evolutionary Computation Methods: Theory, Empirics, and Real-World Applications, together with
Thomas Bartz-Beielstein and
Christine Zarges,
April 12-14, Brno, Czech Republic
- at
IEEE CEC 2023:
organizer of special session
AutoDesign4EC: Automated Algorithm Design for Evolutionary Computation, together with
Tome Eftimov,
Peter Korošec, and
Manuel López-Ibáñez, July 1-5, Chicago, USA
- 2022 events that I have (co-)organized:
- Open Optimization Competition 2022, joint effort of our
IOHprofiler
and Facebook's Nevergrad teams
- EvoStar 2022 special session on
Analysis of Evolutionary Computation Methods: Theory, Empirics, and Real-World Applications
- IEEE WCCI CEC 2022 special session on
Automated Algorithm Design for Evolutionary Computation
- Workshop Benchmarking@GECCO 2022 (focus: benchmarking for industrial applications)
- Workshop Benchmarking@PPSN 2022 (focus: benchmarking as intermediate between theory and practice)
- Tutorials at
GECCO 2022 and at
WCCI 2022 on
"Benchmarking and analyzing iterative optimization heuristics with IOHprofiler"
Our update on Nevergrad is available in the SIGEVOlution newsletter.
Nevergrad is a benchmarking platform for black-box optimization algorithms. Nicely complements our own IOHprofiler software for benchmarking and evaluating iterative optimization heuristics. The two tools are compatible. Check it out on our
web-based version of IOHanalyzer. Happy to answer questions about any of the two projects :-)
We paired up with the AutoML team for the
black-box optimization challenge at
NeurIPS 2020. We ranked first and third in the
alternate and the
main leaderboard, respectively.
A short summary of our entry is available on arxiv.
I have defended my habilitation (HDR) on Friday, December 18, 2020. The manuscript is available
on HAL. A public version of the slides (not 1:1 what was shown during the defense) is available
here.
Two survey articles that cover most of my works on black-box complexity and parameter control from before 2018:
- C. Doerr: Complexity Theory for Black-Box Optimization Heuristics (link to arXiv version)
- B. Doerr and C. Doerr: Theory of Parameter Control for Discrete Black-Box Optimization: Provable Performance Gains Through Dynamic Parameter Choices (link to arXiv version)
- Mathematical and empirical aspects of iterative optimization heuristics (aka randomized search algorithms) such as local search algorithms, evolutionary algorithms, and other black-box optimization techniques
At the moment, I am particularly interested in online algorithm configuration and different aspects of benchmarking.
- Black-box complexity, aka randomized query complexity
- Randomized and quasi-randomized algorithms in general
- Geometric discrepancies, in particular computational aspects of the star discrepancy
A complete list of publications can be found here.
My
Google scholar profile and the
dblp entry are more or less complete (as far as dblp is complete, note that it does not list some of the works on discrepancies nor some of the book chapters).
For all other data bases, please note that they are usually incomplete because of the change of my family name in 2012.
Courses:
- Winter 2023/24:
Lecture on Solving Optimization Problems with Search Heuristics,
MPRI (Parisian Master of Computer Science) course 2.24.2,
together with Evripidis Bampis and Benjamin Doerr.
- Winter 2022/23:
Lecture on Solving Optimization Problems with Search Heuristics,
MPRI (Parisian Master of Computer Science) course 2.24.2,
together with Evripidis Bampis and Benjamin Doerr.
- Winter 2021/22:
Lecture on Solving Optimization Problems with Search Heuristics,
MPRI (Parisian Master of Computer Science) course 2.24.2,
together with Evripidis Bampis.
- Winter 2019/20:
Lecture on Solving Optimization Problems with Search Heuristics,
MPRI (Parisian Master of Computer Science) course 2.24.2,
together with Christoph Dürr.
- Winter 2018/19:
Lecture on Solving Optimization Problems with Search Heuristics,
MPRI (Parisian Master of Computer Science) course 2.24.2,
together with Christoph Dürr.
- Winter 2017/18:
Lecture on Solving Optimization Problems with Search Heuristics,
MPRI (Parisian Master of Computer Science) course 2.24.2,
together with Christoph Dürr.
- Winter 2016/17:
Lecture on Solving Optimization Problems with Search Heuristics,
MPRI (Parisian Master of Computer Science) course 2.24.2,
together with Christoph Dürr.
- Winter 2015/16:
Lecture on Solving Optimization Problems with Search Heuristics,
MPRI (Parisian Master of Computer Science) course 2.24.2,
together with Christoph Dürr.
- Summer Semester 2012:
Co-organizer of the lecture Basic Mathematical Techniques for Computer Scientists,
together with
Timo Kötzing,
Xavier Pèrez-Gimènez,
Chandan Saha,
Thomas Sauerwald,
Reto Spöhel, and
Jens Schmidt
- Summer Semester 2012:
Co-organizer of the seminar Reading Group in Algorithms,
together with Kurt Mehlhorn.
- Winter Semester 2011/12:
Co-organizer of the seminar Reading Group in Algorithms,
together with Kurt Mehlhorn.
- Summer Semester 2011:
Co-organizer of the seminar Reading Group in Algorithms,
together with Kurt Mehlhorn.
- Summer Semester 2010:
Teaching assistant for Algorithms and Randomization
held by Chinmoy Dutta, Nikolaos Fountoulakis, and Anna Huber.
- Winter Semester 2004 - Winter Semester 2006:
Teaching assistant for various courses held by the department for mathematics at Kiel University
Current PostDocs and ATERs:
- Denis Antipov (PostDoc, since 09/2024).
Funded via an émergence project of Alliance Sorbonne Université
- (we are recruiting -- do not hesitate to reach out if you are interested in working with us :-) )
Former PostDocs:
- Roman Kalkreuth (PostDoc, 06/2023-03/2024, now Assistant Professor at RWTH Aachen).
Was funded via the HQI project.
- Koen van der Blom (PostDoc, 09/2022-02/2024).
Was funded by ANR T-ERC grant VARIATION.)
- Anja Jankovic (ATER, 09/2021-08/2023, now PostDoc at RWTH Aachen).
Until 12/2021 Anja was a PhD student in our team.
- Elena Raponi (05/2021-09/2021, 12/2021-05/2023, now Assistant Professor at LIACS, Leiden University, NL).
Elena first came to Paris for a jointly supervised internship at
FAIR and from 12/2021 she was a PRIME PostDoc fellow of the
German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)
- Alexis Robbes (PostDoc, 11/2021-02/2023, now PostDoc in Toulouse)
Was funded by DIM-RFSI project Opt4SysBio
- Martin Krejca (01/2021-08/2022, now Assistant Professor at Ecole Polytechnique)
From 01/2021-04/2021, Martin was working with us on the DIM RFSI AlgoSelect project. From May 2021 until August 2022, he was a fellow of the
Paris Region Fellowship Programme, a Marie Curie COFUND.
- Hao Wang (01/2020-08/2020, now Assistant professor at LIACS, Leiden University, NL)
Was funded via the DIM RFSI project AlgoSelect.
Current PhD Students:
Former PhD Students:
- Main advisor of PhD student François Clement (10/2021-07/2024).
Title of his PhD thesis: An Optimization Perspective on the Construction of Low-Discrepancy Point Sets
Co-supervised with
Luís Paquete
Funded by a scholarship of the EDITE doctoral school.
François is now PostDoc at the University of Washington, Seattle, US.
- Co-Advisor of PhD student
Furong Ye (10/2017-06/2022, thesis submitted 12/2021).
Title of his PhD thesis: Benchmarking Discrete Optimization Heuristics: From Building a Sound Experimental Environment to Algorithm Configuration
PhD student at Leiden University, co-supervised with
Thomas Bäck and
Hao Wang
Furong was PostDoc at LIACS until 08/2023, then PostDoc at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing until 08/2024, and he is now back at LIACS.
- Co-Advisor of PhD student Quentin Renau (02/2019-01/2022).
Title of his PhD thesis: Landscape-Aware Selection of Metaheuristics for the Optimization of Radar Networks
CIFRE thesis with Thales, co-supervised with
Johann Dreo (02/2019-02/2021),
Yann Semet (02/2021-01/2022),
and
Benjamin Doerr.
Quentin is now PostDoc at Edinburgh Napier University, with Emma Hart
- Main advisor of PhD student
Anja Jankovic (10/2018-12/2021).
Title of her PhD thesis: Towards Online Landscape-Aware Algorithm Selection in Numerical Black-Box Optimization
Anja was funded by a scholarship from the EDITE doctoral school.
After her PhD she was teaching assistant in our team for 2 years and she is now a PostDoc at RWTH Aachen.
- Co-advisor of PhD student
Jing Yang (10/2015-09/2018).
Title of her PhD thesis: From a Complexity Theory of Evolutionary Computation to Superior Randomized Search Heuristics
PhD student at Ecole Polytechnique, co-supervised with Benjamin Doerr.
Moved to an industrial researcher position after the PhD.
Research Engineers:
- We are recruiting an research engineer or software developer for the ERC dynaBBO project
Former Research Engineers:
(Current and Former) Bachelor and Master Students and PhD interns:
- Advisor of Master student Gianluca Covini (Erasmus student from University of Pavia, Italy, 03/2024-12/2024).
Title of the project: Enhancing Dynamic Algorithm Configuration via Theory-guided Benchmarks
- Co-Advisor of Master student Matt van den Nieuwenhuijzen (student at LIACS, Leiden University, 05/2023-04/2024).
Title of the project: Selecting Pre-trained Models for Transfer Learning with Data-centric Meta-features
(joint with Jan van Rijn and Henry Gouk)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Duri Janett (Erasmus student from ETH Zurich, 09/2022-02/2023).
Title of the project: Design and Analysis of New Variation Operators for Randomized Search Heuristics
(joint with Johannes Lengler)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Maria Laura Santoni (Erasmus student from Camerino University, 03/2022-09/2022).
Title of the project: Black-Box Optimization Benchmarking on Real-World Industrial Applications
(joint with Renato de Leone and Elena Raponi)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Navin Pophare (Leiden University, 10/2021-06/2022).
Title of the project: Analyzing the Anytime Performance of Numerical Black-Box Optimization Heuristics
(joint with Diederick Vermetten
and Hao Wang)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Alix Zheng (Sorbonne Université, 06/2021-09/2021).
Title of the project: Automated Algorithm Configuration for Genetic Algorithms
(joint with Johann Dreo)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Océane Fourquet (Sorbonne Université, 02/2021-08/2021).
Title of the project: Monotonic Models for Classification Tasks in Systems Biology
(joint with Benno Schwikowski and
Martin Krejca)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Huilin Li (Leiden University, 03/2021-05/2022).
Title of the project: Standardizing Nature-Inspired Optimizers
(joint with Thomas Bäck,
Anna Kononova, and
Diederick Vermetten)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Dominik Schröder (Leiden University, 07/2020-04/2021).
Title of the project: Dynamic algorithm selection for continuous black-box optimization
(joint with Thomas Bäck and
Hao Wang)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Amine Aziz-Alaoui (ISAE-SUPAERO, summer 2020).
Title of the project: Automated Algorithm Design using Exploratory Landscape Analysis
(joint with Benjamin Doerr and
Johann Dreo)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Andy Rabetafika (ISAE-SUPAERO, summer 2020).
Title of the project: Machine learning and discrepancy theory
(joint with Benjamin Doerr and
Johann Dreo)
- Advisor of Master student Raphaël Cosson (MPRI, Paris Diderot Univ., summer 2019).
Title of the project: Online Configuration of Heuristic Optimization Algorithms
- Co-Advisor of Master student Vincent Aubry (MPRI, ENS, summer 2019).
Title of the project: Query Complexity of Mastermind
(joint with Benjamin Doerr)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Anissa Kheireddine (Sorbonne Université, summer 2019).
Title of the project: Dynamic Algorithm Configuration for Interactive Learning
(joint with Thibaut Lust)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Diederick Vermetten (Leiden University, summer 2019).
Title of the project: Online Selection of CMA-ES Variants
(joint with Thomas Bäck)
- Advisor of student intern Nathan Buskulic (Sorbonne Université, summer 2018).
Title of the project: Optimal Evolutionary Algorithms with Dynamic Parameters
- Co-Advisor of Master student Anja Jankovic (Sorbonne Université, summer 2018).
Title of the project: Randomness in Scheduling
(joint with Fanny Pascual
and Nguyễn Kim Thắng)
- Advisor of Master student Eduardo Carvalho Pinto (MPRI, Ecole Polytechnique, summer 2017).
Title of the project: Self-Adjusting Parameter Choices for Discrete Black-Box Optimization
- Co-Advisor of Master student Jing Yang (Ecole Polytechnique, summer 2015).
Title of the project: Tight Bounds for the Unbiased Black-Box Complexity of OneMax
(joint with Benjamin Doerr)
- Co-Advisor of Master student Axel de Perthuis de Laillevault (Ecole Polytechnique, summer 2014).
Title of the project: Evolutionary Algorithms with Iterated Initial Sampling
(joint with Benjamin Doerr)
- Co-Advisor of the Master student Franziska Ebel (MPI, defended spring 2013).
Title of the thesis: Lessons from the Black-Box: Fast Crossover-Based Genetic Algorithms
(joint with Benjamin Doerr)
- Advisor of PhD student intern G. Ramakrishna (MPI, summer 2012).
Title of the project: Computing Minimum Cycle Bases in Graphs of Bounded Treewidth
- Advisor of Master student Vijay Ingalalli (MPI, defended autumn 2011).
Title of the thesis: Evolutionary Algorithms to Compute Lower Bounds for the Star Discrepancy
- Co-Advisor of student intern Jong-Hyun Lee (MPI, winter 2011/12).
Title of the project: Playing Mastermind with Constant Size Memory
(joint with Benjamin Doerr and Reto Spöhel)
- French national and local responsibilities and activities:
- Scientific advisor ("déléguée scientifique") for CNRS Sciences informatiques, the institute for Computer Science at CNRS. This responsibility takes up around 40% of my time.
- Co-responsible for the Algorithms and Complexity research group (Groupe de Travail Complexité et Algorithmes, GT CoA), part of GDR-IM (since June 2023)
- Co-responsible for the "commission de communication" of the LIP6 Computer Science lab of Sorbonne Université (since Feb 2023 - Sep 2023, stopped after accepting my new role as "déléguée scientifique" for CNRS)
- Member of the "commission scientifique" de l'UFR d’Ingénierie of Sorbonne Université (scientific board of the engineering department of Sorbonne University, since January 2021)
- Member of the "commission locaux" of the LIP6 Computer Science lab (since July 2020)
-
Associate Editor of
-
Guest editor for special issues:
- Member of the Advisory Board of Springer's Natural Computing Series.
- Working group leader for "Algorithm Selection and Configuration" (WG5) and management committee member of
COST action 22137, the
Randomised Optimisation Algorithms Research Network (ROAR-NET). 2023-2027
- Selected previous responsibilities:
-
Member of the
EC Technical Committee
of the
IEEE Computational Intelligence Society. (2020-2023).
-
Vice-chair and management committee member of
COST action 15140
on Improving Applicability of Nature-Inspired Optimisation by Joining Theory and Practice (ImAppNIO). 2016-2020.
-
(Co-)organizer of [this list is outdated...]
- Open Optimization Competition 2021, joint effort of our
IOHprofiler
and Facebook's Nevergrad teams.
- GECCO workshop on Benchmarking
- GECCO workshop on Analysing Algorithmic Behaviour of Optimisation Heuristics
- CEC workshop on Benchmarking
- CEC Special Session RepL4Opt: Representation Learning meets Meta-heuristic Optimization
- Lorentz Center Workshop on
Benchmarked: Optimization meets Machine Learning, with
Mike Preuss,
Marc Schoenauer,
Thomas Stützle, and
Joaquin Vanschoren. The online event had more than 100 active participants. The on-site workshop has been postponed to 2022.
-
Open Optimization Competition 2020, joint effort of
our
IOHprofiler
and Facebook's Nevergrad teams
- Benchmarking Best Practices Workshop at
GECCO 2020 and at
PPSN 2020, joint effort of our
Benchmarking Network
- Dagstuhl seminar 19431 on Theory of Randomized Optimization Heuristics, October 2019,
together with
Carlos M. Fonseca,
Tobias Friedrich,
Xin Yao
- Black Box Discrete Optimization Benchmarking (BB-DOB) Workshop at GECCO 2019, joint with
Pietro S. Oliveto,
Thomas Weise, and
Ales Zamuda
- Dagstuhl seminar 17191 on Theory of Randomized Optimization Heuristics, held in May 2017,
together with
Christian Igel,
Lothar Thiele, and
Xin Yao
- ImAppNIO COST Training School, held in Paris, October 2017, 7 days, 35 participants + 7 lecturers
- Women@GECCO workshop 2016
- Women@GECCO workshop 2015
- Women@GECCO workshop 2014
- Colloquium on Combinatorics KolKom 2010
Tutorial Speaker at
- GECCO 2024 on
Benchmarking and Analyzing Iterative Optimization Heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Diederick Vermetten,
Jacob de Nobel, and
Thomas Bäck.
- WCCI/CEC 2024 on
Benchmarking and Analyzing Iterative Optimization Heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Elena Raponi,
Thomas Bäck,
Jacob de Nobel,
Diederick Vermetten,
Anna V Kononova, and
Niki van Stein.
- GECCO 2023 on
Benchmarking and Analyzing Iterative Optimization Heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Thomas Bäck,
Jacob de Nobel,
Diederick Vermetten,
Hao Wang, and
Furong Ye.
- CEC 2023 on
Benchmarking and Analyzing Iterative Optimization Heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Thomas Bäck,
Jacob de Nobel,
Diederick Vermetten,
Hao Wang, and
Furong Ye.
- GECCO 2022 on
Benchmarking and Analyzing Iterative Optimization Heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Thomas Bäck,
Jacob de Nobel,
Diederick Vermetten,
Hao Wang, and
Furong Ye.
- IEEE WCCI CEC 2022 on
Benchmarking and Analyzing Iterative Optimization Heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Thomas Bäck,
Jacob de Nobel,
Diederick Vermetten,
Hao Wang, and
Furong Ye.
- GECCO 2020 on Dynamic parameter choices in evolutionary computation, since this year joint with
Gregor Papa
- GECCO 2020 on Benchmarking and Analyzing Iterative Optimization Heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Thomas Bäck,
Ofer M. Shir,
Hao Wang
- IEEE WCCI CEC 2020 on Benchmarking and Analyzing Iterative Optimization Heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Thomas Bäck,
Ofer M. Shir,
Hao Wang
- IEEE WCCI CEC 2020 on Dynamic parameter choices in evolutionary computation, with
Gregor Papa
- GECCO 2019 on Dynamic parameter choices in evolutionary computation
- CEC 2019 on
benchmarking iterative optimization heuristics with IOHprofiler, with
Hao Wang and
Thomas Bäck
- PPSN 2018 on Dynamic parameter choices in evolutionary computation
- GECCO 2018 on Dynamic parameter choices in evolutionary computation
- GECCO 2017 on Non-Static parameter choices in evolutionary computation
- GECCO 2016 on Theory for Non-Theoreticians, with B. Doerr
- IEEE WCCI CEC 2016 on Theory for Non-Theoreticians, with B. Doerr
- GECCO 2014 on Black-box complexity: from complexity theory to playing Mastermind, with B. Doerr
- GECCO 2013 on Black-box complexity: from complexity theory to playing Mastermind, with B. Doerr
Invited speaker at
- Vers une supply chain alimentaire durable, May 2, Paris
- subject to, Podcast, online
- JNIM 2024, March 18-21, Grenboble, France
-
ROADEF 2024, French OR conference, March 4-7, 2024, Amiens, France.
- Séminaire Philippe Flajolet, February 8, Institut Henri Poincare (IHP), Paris, France
-
11th workshop on Computational Intelligence and Data Mining, September 22-26, 2023, Tatra, Slovakia (participated online).
-
17th ACM/SIGEVO Conference on Foundations of Genetic Algorithms (FOGA XVII), August 30 - September 1, 2023, Potsdam, Germany.
- Summer School on Automatic Algorithm Design 2023, June 12-16, 2023, Lille, France.
- Séminaire Parisien d'Optimisation, June 5, 2023, Institut Henri Poincare (IHP), Paris, France.
-
AutoML Seminar, March 30, 2023, online.
recording
-
Students and Young Professionals workshop at
at IEEE SSCI 2022, December 5, 2022, Singapore and online.
slides
- BIOMA 2022 conference, November 17-18, 2022, Maribor, Slovenia
- AutoML fall school, October 10-13, 2022, Freiburg, Germany.
slides
- 2nd Workshop Complexity and Algorithms (CoA 2022), September 26-28, 2022, Paris, France
- SIGEVO summer school, June 20-24, 2022, online event
- Students and Young Professionals Meeting of
IEEE SSCI 2021, online event.
slides
- SIGEVO summer school, July 5-9, 2021, online event
- ECOLE ITN summer school, June 8, 2021, online event
- Caleidoscope Research school in computational complexity, June 15-19, 2020, Paris, France (canceled, COVID-19)
- GECCO 2017 Summer School, Berlin, Germany
- MENDEL International Conference on Soft Computing 2017, Brno, Czech Republic
- JGA 2016, Paris, France
- ALEA in Europe Meeting 2016, Munich, Germany
- Artificial Evolution Summer School 2013 in Quiberon, France
Program Committee Activities
- Program Chair for
- (Senior) Area Chair
- PC member
- General Computer Science conferences:
- Evolutionary Computation and Artificial Intelligence:
- ACM Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO) (since 2011, yearly conference)
- International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI) (since 2020, yearly)
- European Conference on Machine Learning and Principles and Practice of Knowledge Discovery in Databases (ECML PKDD) (since 2020, yearly)
- Foundations of Genetic Algorithms (FOGA) (since 2015, every 2 years)
- IEEE WCCI Congress on Evolutionary Computation (CEC) (since 2013, yearly)
- Parallel Problem Solving from Nature (PPSN) (since 2012, every 2 years)
- IEEE Symposium Series on Computational Intelligence (SSCI) (since 2016, yearly)
- Artificial Evolution (EA) (since 2017, roughly every 2 years)
- European Conference on Evolutionary Computation in Combinatorial Optimisation (EvoCOP) (since 2017, yearly)
- Conference on Evolutionary Computation Theory and Applications (ECTA 2019)
- ICACI 2018
- European Conference on Artificial Intelligence (ECAI 2020)
- AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI, student abstracts) (2020, 2021)
- International Conference on Machine Learning, Optimization and Data science (LOD) (2020)
- Distributed Computing:
IPDPS 2017,
ICDCN 2015,
FoMC 2013 (co-located with DISC 2013).
- Smaller Conferences and Workshops:
WCIDM - ITAT (since 2019),
BB-DOB@GECCO 2019,
BOCIA 2018,
BB-DOB@GECCO 2018,
BB-DOB@PPSN 2018.
Other organizer roles at major conferences:
- Best paper awards:
- runner-up at FOGA 2023 for Using Automated Algorithm Configuration for Parameter Control, joint work with Deyao Chen, Maxim Buzdalov, and Nguyen Dang
- at GECCO 2023 (ENUM track) for Using Affine Combinations of BBOB Problems for Performance Assessment, joint work with Diederick Vermetten and Furong Ye
- at GECCO 2022 (GECH track) for Theory-inspired Parameter Control Benchmarks for Dynamic Algorithm Configuration, joint work with André Biedenkapp, Nguyen Dang, Martin S. Krejca, and Frank Hutter
- at CEC 2021 for Blending Dynamic Programming with Monte Carlo Simulation for Bounding the Running Time of Evolutionary Algorithms, joint work with Kirill Antonov, Maxim Buzdalov, and Arina Buzdalova
- at EvoApplications 2021 for Towards Feature-Based Performance Regression Using Trajectory Data, joint work with Anja Jankovic and Tome Eftimov
- at GECCO 2016 (joint award for the ACO-SI, CO, and THEORY tracks) for The (1+1) Elitist Black-Box Complexity of LeadingOnes, joint work with Johannes Lengler
- at GECCO 2013 (GA track) for Lessons From the Black-Box: Fast Crossover-Based Genetic Algorithms, joint work with Benjamin Doerr and Franziska Ebel
- at AlgoTel 2013 for Rumor Spreading in Random Evolving Graphs, joint work with Andrea Clementi, Pierluigi Crescenzi, Pierre Fraigniaud, Francesco Pasquale, Riccardo Silvestri (short French version of our Random Structures & Algorithms paper)
- at GECCO 2012 (theory track) for Reducing the Arity in Unbiased Black-Box Complexity, joint work with Benjamin Doerr
- at GECCO 2010 (theory track) for Multiplicative Drift Analysis, joint work with Benjamin Doerr and Daniel Johannsen
- 2022 CNRS bronze medal
- 1st and 3rd prize in the two tracks of the black-box optimization challenge at
NeurIPS 2020, joint with the AutoML team.
A short summary of our entry is available on arxiv.
- Feodor Lynen Research Fellowship for Postdoctoral Researchers of the Alexander von Humboldt foundation
- Otto Hahn Medal of the Max-Planck-Society
- Google Europe PhD Fellowship in Randomized Algorithms
- EU funded
-
ERC Consolidator Grant
dynaBBO: Dynamic Selection and Configuration of Black-box Optimization Algorithms
(2024-2029, PI, 1,999,975 euros)
-
COST action 22137
Randomised Optimisation Algorithms Research Network (ROAR-NET)
(2023-2027, working group leader "Algorithms and Complexity", member of management committee)
-
COST action 15140
on Improving Applicability of Nature-Inspired Optimisation by Joining Theory and Practice (ImAppNIO)
(2016-2020, vice chair, management committee, and member of STSM and ITC grants selection committee)
- Bi-national projects
- 2024-2025: Multi-objective Approaches for Generating Low-Discrepancy Point Sets (MOLD), joint with
Kathrin Klamroth from
University of Wuppertal, Germany.
(French PI, funding for mutual research visits)
Funded by PROCOPE call of Campus France
- 2023-2024: DISCREPANCY: Algorithms and Complexity for Discrepancy Problems, joint with
Luís Paquete from
University of Coimbra, Portugal.
(French PI, funding for mutual research visits)
Funded by PESSOA call of Campus France
- 2023-2024: Automated Configuration, Selection, and Design of Iterative Optimization Heuristics, joint with
Tome Eftimov from
JSI, Slovenia.
(French PI, funding for mutual research visits)
Funded by PROTEUS call of Campus France
- 2023: Self-Adjusting Algorithms for High-dimensional Black-box Optimization, joint with
Aneta Neumann from
The University of Adelaide, Australia.
(French PI, 15k AUSD funding for mutual research visits)
Funded by CNRS-Adelaide Mobility Scheme
- 2022-23: Complexity Reduction Techniques for Surrogate-based Optimization of Composite Structures, joint with
Fabian Duddeck from
TU Munich, Germany.
(French PI, funding for mutual research visits)
Funded by BayFrance (Franco-Bavarian University cooperation center)
- 2020-2022: International Emerging Action (IAE PRC CNRS/RFBR) project, joint with Benjamin Doerr, for collaboration with Arina Buzdalova and Maxim Buzdalov from ITMO University, Russia on Theoretical Foundation of Dynamic Parameter Selection for Randomized Optimization Heuristics
(French PI, funding for mutual research visits and minor expenses)
Funded by CNRS and RFBR
- French national projects
- Project funded by ANR (French National Research Funding Agency ):
- 2024-2027:
ANR-DFG PRCI grant "Bridging Black-Box Optimization and Machine Learning for Dynamic Algorithm Configuration (Opt4DAC)"
(joint project between the French and German national research funding agencies)
(French PI, French funding is for 1 PhD thesis, 2 research internships, travels, and small equipment. Similar funding available for the German partner.)
German PI is Marius Lindauer
- 2022-2024:
ANR T-ERC grant
(PI, funding for 18 months PostDoc, 1 research internship, travels, and small equipment)
- 2022-2026:
HQI: France Hybrid HPC-QC Initiative
(member of WP3, task 3.1 Optimization, funding for 24 months PostDoc and minor expenses)
- Project funded by CNRS Sciences Informatiques:
- 2023: IOHprofiler
(PI, funding for a 12 months research engineering position)
- 2022: Randomized Search Heuristics: From Theory to Practice (RandSearch), joint with
Benjamin Doerr
(PI, funding for research internships, travels, and small equipment)
DIM RFSI projects:
- 2020-2023: Optimization Meets Systems Biology (Opt4SysBio), joint with
Benno Schwikowski from
Institut Pasteur.
(PI, funding for 18 months PostDoc position, research internships, and expenses)
- 2019-2022: Automated Algorithm Selection for Discrete Black-Box Optimization (AlgoSelect)
(PI, funding for 12 months PostDoc position)
- 2018-2020: Online Configuration of Heuristic Optimization Algorithms
(PI, funding for research internships and expenses)
PGMO, Fondation Mathématique Jacques Hadamard (FMJH) and/or Labex Mathématique Hadamard (LMH) projects:
- 2020-22: Understanding and Developing Evolutionary Algorithms via Mathematical Runtime Analyses (member)
- 2019: Passive Radar Coverage Optimization (member)
- 2018: Analysis of Evolutionary Algorithms: Beyond Expected Optimization Times (PI)
- 2017: Self-Adjusting Parameter Choices in Heuristic Optimization (PI)
- 2016: Parameter Optimization via Drift Analysis (PI)
- 2015: How Randomness Helps in Scheduling Problems (member)
- 2014: Towards a Complexity Theory for Black Box Optimization (PI)
Projects funded by Alliance Sorbonne Université:
Projects funded by the LIP6 laboratory:
- 2022: Semantic Graph Mining for Black-Box Optimisation
(co-PI, together with Christophe Marsala)
- 2019: Interactive multi-objective optimization
(co-PI, together with Thibaut Lust)
Funding for my own PostDoc and PhD positions:
- 09/2024, 2 weeks, Marcus Gallagher, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia
- 09/2024, 1 month, Vanessa Volz, CWI Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- 09/2024, 1 month, Imène Ait Abderrahim, Djilali Bounaâma, Khemis Miliana, Algeria
- 09/2024, 1 week, Vitor Basto Fernandes, ISCTE - University Institute of Lisbon, Portugal
- 06/2024, 2 weeks, Denis Antipov, University of Adelaide, Australia
- 05/2024, 7 weeks, Deyao Chen, St Andrews, UK
- 03/2024, 1 week, Diederick Vermetten, Leiden University, The Netherlands
- 03/2024, 1 month, Günter Rudolph, Dortmund, Germany
- 02/2024, 1 week, Kathrin Klamroth, University of Wuppertal, Germany
- 01/2024, 1 week, Gonçalo Lopes, University of Coimbra, Portugal
- 11/2023, 2 weeks, Tome Eftimov, Jožef Stefan Institute, Slovenia
- 11/2023, 1 week, Carlos Fonseca, University of Coimbra, Portugal
- 11/2023, 1.5 weeks: Nguyen Dang, St. Andrews, UK
- 11/2023, 2 weeks, Aneta Neumann, Adelaide, Australia
- 10/2023, 1 month, Günter Rudolph, Dortmund, Germany
- 07/2023 and 09/2023, 1 week each, Frank Neumann, Adelaide, Australia
- 07/2023 and 09/2023, 1 week each, Aneta Neumann, Adelaide, Australia
- 06/2023, 1 week, Michael Gnewuch, Osnabrück University, Germany
- 06/2023, 1 week, Nathan Kirk, Queen's University Belfast, UK
- 05-08/2023, 3 months, Prabhant Singh, TU Eindhoven, The Netherlands
- 05-11/2023, 6 months, Matt van den Nieuwenhuijzen, Leiden University, The Netherlands
- 03/2023, 1 week, Carolin Benjamins and Theresa Eimer, University of Hannover, Germany
- 03/2023, 1 week, Diederick Vermetten and Furong Ye, Leiden University, The Netherlands
- 11/2022, 1 week, Alexandre D. B. Jesus, University of Coimbra, Portugal
- 09/2022, 1 week, Carolin Benjamins, University of Hannover, Germany
- 09/2022, 1 weeks: Nguyen Dang, St. Andrews, UK
- 06/2022, 3 days, Hao Wang, LIACS, Leiden, The Netherlands
- 06/2022, 1 week, Diederick Vermetten, LIACS, Leiden, The Netherlands
- 06/2022, 4 weeks, Nguyen Dang, St. Andrews, UK
- 06/2022, 2.5 weeks, Frank Neumann, Adelaide, Australia
- 06/2022, 2.5 week, Aneta Neumann, Adelaide, Australia
- 05/2022, 3 days, Fabian Duddeck, TU Munich, Germany
- 05/2022, 3 days, Gokhan Serhat, Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, Stuttgart, Germany
- 03/2022, 1 week, Hao Wang, LIACS, Leiden, The Netherlands
- 03/2022, 10 days, Tome Eftimov, Jožef Stefan Institute, Slovenia
- 02-05/2022, 3 months, Kirill Antonov, ITMO University, Saint Petersburg, Russia.
- 02-05/2022, 3 months, Ana Kostovska, Jozef Stefan Institute, Slovenia. Supported by a SPECIES scholarship
- 10/2021, 2 weeks, Manuel López-Ibáñez, University of Málaga, Spain. LIP6 invited professor
A PDF with my CV is available here. (last updated June 2022)
Short summary of my CV:
- Two kids, born 04/2013 and 09/2015
- Education
- 12/2020: Habilitation à diriger des recherches (HDR, Sorbonne Université, France),
HDR manuscript, slides.
- 12/2011: PhD (Computer Science, Saarland University and Max Planck Institute for Informatics, Germany),
PhD thesis
- 08/2007: Diplom (Mathematics, Kiel University, Germany),
Diplomarbeit (in German, main result appeared in the Journal of Complexity, paper).
Since 10/2013:
CNRS researcher at the LIP6 laboratory,
Sorbonne Université
(formerly Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6).
Since 10/2022: research director (in French: Directrice de recherche, DR)
10/2012 - 09/2013:
Postdoctoral researcher at LIAFA (now IRIF), Paris Diderot University (Paris 7).
My stay was supported by a Feodor Lynen Research Fellowship for Postdoctoral Researchers (Humboldt foundation).
I have also been supported by the Robert Bosch Foundation, via their Fast Track program.
01/2012 - 09/2013 (part time from October 2012):
Postdoctoral researcher at the Max-Planck-Institut für Informatik
01/2010 - 12/2011:
Ph. D. student in Computer Science at the Universität des Saarlandes, Saarbrücken, Germany and the Max-Planck-Institut für Informatik
My Ph. D. studies were supported by the Google Europe Fellowship in Randomized Algorithms (click here for program details)
The thesis has been awarded the Otto Hahn Medal of the Max-Planck-Society.
The advisor of my thesis is Benjamin Doerr and the supervisor is Kurt Mehlhorn
12/2007 - 01/2012:
Consultant with McKinsey&Company, Inc., Munich. From December 2009 until January 2012, I was on educational leave and have worked for McKinsey only on an occasional basis.
08/2007:
Diploma in Mathematics at the Christian-Albrechts-Universität (CAU) Kiel
Title of my diploma thesis: Approximative Berechnung der Sterndiskrepanz (advisor: Dr. Michael Gnewuch, supervisor: Prof. Dr. Anand Srivastav)
07/2006 - 10/2006:
Internship with Deutsche Lufthansa AG
10/2003 - 08/2007:
Studies of Mathematics (major subject), Business Administration (minor subject, Studienkolleg), Economics (Vordiplom, for fun), and Computer Science (for fun)
at the CAU Kiel
My studies were supported by a stipend of the Klaus Murmann Fellowship Programme of the Foundation of German Business/ Studienförderwerk Klaus Murmann der Stiftung der Deutschen Wirtschaft (SDW)
07/2003:
Abitur at the Heinrich-Suso-Gymnasium, Konstanz
08/2000 - 07/2001:
AFS high school exchange student in Tobati, Paraguay.
Page last modified:
October 7, 2024.