Introduction to evolution strategies

Abstract

This tutorial gives a basic introduction to evolution strategies, a class of evolutionary algorithms. Key features such as mutation, recombination and selection operators are explained, and specifically the concept of self-adaptation of strategy parameters is introduced. All algorithmic concepts are explained to a level of detail such that an implementation of basic evolution strategies is possible. In addition, the tutorial also presents a brief taxonomy of contemporary evolution strategy variants, including e.g. the CMA-ES and variations thereof, and compares their performance for a small number of function evalutions - which represents many of today's practical application cases. Some guidelines for utilization as well as some application examples are also given.