EvoStar


EvoStar, or Evo*, is an international scientific event devoted to evolutionary computation held in Europe. Its structure has evolved over time and it currently comprises four conferences: EuroGP the annual conference on Genetic Programming, EvoApplications, the International Conference on the Applications of Evolutionary Computation, EvoCOP, European Conference on Evolutionary Computation in Combinatorial Optimisation, and EvoMUSART, the International Conference on Computational Intelligence in Music, Sound, Art and Design. According to a 2016 study EvoApplications is a Q1 conference, while EuroGP and EvoCOP are both Q2. In 2021, EuroGP, EvoApplications and EvoCOP obtained a CORE rank B.
Other conferences in the area include the ACM Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference, the IEEE Congress on Evolutionary Computation and the bi-annual Parallel Problem Solving from Nature.

History

Originally run under the name of EvoWorkshops, the event was an outcome of EvoNet, the Network of Excellence in Evolutionary Computing, funded by the European Commission under the Information Societies Technology Programme, FP5-IST. EvoNet was coordinated by Terry Fogarty and managed by Jennifer Willies, both at Edinburgh Napier University at the time, and had more than 100 participating nodes.
After EvoNet funding ended, support was provided by Edinburgh Napier University to help EvoStar to continue over the years. In 2014 the SPECIES Society was set up to provide an appropriate legal structure for future organisation and support of the EvoStar conferences. SPECIES support of EvoStar became effective in 2017, with Edinburgh Napier University taking a sponsoring role.

Editions

The first edition was held in Paris in 1998. Subsequent editions took place in Göteborg, Edinburgh, Lake Como, Kinsale, Essex, Coimbra, Lausanne, Budapest, Valencia, Napoli, Tübingen, Istanbul, Torino, Málaga, Vienna, Granada, Copenhagen, Porto, Amsterdam, Parma and Leipzig. In 2020, Evostar was to be held in Seville, Spain, but due to COVID-19 pandemic, it was finally held as an online conference. In 2021 Evostar was expected to be held in Seville, but was again held as an online conference. In 2022 Evostar was held in Madrid, Spain, as a hybrid event. It was followed in 2023 by Brno in the Czech Republic,
in 2024 by Aberystwyth, and in 2025 by University of Trieste, again in person and via the Internet. In 2026, EvoStar will take place in Toulouse, France.

Toulouse / Hybrid event (2026)

The 29th edition will take place during 8-10 April and will be held at Toulouse Capitole University and also online.

Trieste / Hybrid event (2025)

The 28th edition took place during 23-25 April and was held in University of Trieste but also online.
: Bing Xue, Mario Giacobini and Luca Manzoni.
: Martin S. Krejca and Markus Wagner.
: Penousal Machado, Colin Johnson and Iria Santos.
: Pablo García-Sánchez, Emma Hart and Sarah L. Thomson.
There were two keynotes:
Tea Tušar, assistant professor Jožef Stefan Institute, Slovenia,
presented "Ideals and Realities of Benchmarking in Evolutionary Multiobjective Optimization".
Daniela Besozzi, associate professor University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy, delivered the closing keynote
"Mathematical modelling, computational intelligence and machine learning in biomedicine: it takes three to tango".

Aberystwyth/ Hybrid event (2024)

The 27th edition took place during 3-5 April and was held in Aberystwyth but also online.
: Bing Xue, Mario Giacobini and Luca Manzoni.
: Thomas Stützle and Markus Wagner.
: Colin Johnson, Sérgio Rebelo and Iria Santos.
: Stephen Smith, João Correia and Christian Cintrano.
For the third time there was a joint event Evolutionary computation and machine learning
between EuroGP and EvoApps: Penousal Machado and Mengjie Zhang.
There were two keynotes:
Jon Timmis, vice chancellor of Aberystwyth University,
presented "Evolution, immunity and robots: An interdisciplinary adventure",
on his research inspired by the immune system and natural swarms.
The conference was closed by Sabine Hauert
"Evolving swarms across scales: from nanomedicine to city logistics".
Between these two invited plenary talks,
Marc Schoenauer moderated a plenary "Coffee" with Dario Floreano and Hod Lipson,
joint winners of this year's
.

Brno / Hybrid event (2023)

The 26th edition took place during 12-14 April and was held mostly in Brno but also online.
: Gisele Pappa, Mario Giacobini and Zdenek Vasicek.
: Leslie Pérez Cáceres and Thomas Stützle.
: Colin Johnson, Nereida Rodríguez-Fernández and Sérgio M. Rebelo.
: João Correia, Stephen Smith and Raneem Qaddoura.
For the second time there was a joint event Evolutionary computation and machine learning between EuroGP and EvoApps, Wolfgang Banzhaf and Penousal Machado.
This time there were three keynotes:
"Gregor Mendel: a story beyond peas" and
Evelyne Lutton "Exploring the Interplay of Cooperation and Competition in evolutionary computation".
This year they were joined by Susan Stepney, the winner of the .
Posters were on site and on line via .

Madrid / Hybrid event (2022)

The 25th edition took place on 20-22 April and was held in Madrid and online.
: Eric Medvet, Gisele Pappa and Bing Xue.
: Leslie Pérez Cáceres and Sébastien Verel.
: Tiago Martins, Nereida Rodríguez-Fernández and Sérgio M. Rebelo.
: Juan Luis Jiménez Laredo, J. Ignacio Hidalgo and Kehinde Oluwatoyin Babaagba.
For the first time joint event Evolutionary computation and machine learning between EuroGP and EvoApps,
Wolfgang Banzhaf and Penousal Machado.
As usual there were two keynotes:
Gabriela Ochoa "Illuminating search spaces" on
and Pedro Larrañaga
"Estimation of Distribution Algorithms in Machine Learning" on
Posters were on site and on line via .

Online event (2021)

The 24th edition took place on 7–9 April and was held as an online event.
Many of the online presentations were recorded and are available via the
organisers' "SPECIES Society" YouTube https://www.youtube.com/c/SPECIESSociety/featured channel.
EuroGP: Ting Hu, Nuno Lourenço, Eric Medvet.
EvoApps: Pedro Castillo, Juanlu Jiménez-Laredo.
EvoCOP: Christine Zarges, Sébastien Verel.
EvoMUSART: Juan Romero, Tiago Martins, Nereida Rodríguez-Fernández.
Late-breaking Abstracts: A.M. Mora, A.I. Esparcia-Alcázar
https://arxiv.org/abs/2106.11804

Online event (2020)

The 23rd edition took place on 15–17 April and was for the first time in history held as an online event. Sessions were available via videoconferencing for registered participants, who could remotely present their work and interact during question time. Conference program chairs were Ting Hu and Nuno Lourenço for EuroGP, Pedro Castillo-Valdivieso for EvoApplications, Luís Paquete and Christine Zarges for EvoCOP and Anikó Ekárt and Juan Romero for EvoMUSART. Anna Esparcia-Alcázar was Coordinator, João Correia was Publicity Chair and Francisco Chicano was Electronic Media Chair. Invited speakers were José Antonio Lozano and Roberto Serra

Leipzig (2019)

The 22nd edition took place from 24 to 26 April in the premises of Leipzig University of Applied Sciences in Leipzig, with Hendrik Richter as local chair. Conference program chairs were Lukas Sekanina and Ting Hu for EuroGP, Paul Kaufmann and Pedro Castillo-Valdivieso for EvoApplications, Arnaud Liefooghe and Luís Paquete for EvoCOP and Anikó Ekárt and Antonios Liapis for EvoMUSART. Anna Esparcia-Alcázar was Coordinator and Pablo García Sánchez was Publicity Chair. A total of 98 papers, short papers and late-breaking abstracts were presented in 22 conference sessions plus a general poster session The opening invited speaker was Risto Miikkulainen while Manja Marz gave the closing keynote.

Parma (2018)

The 2018 edition took place on April 4–6 in the premises of the Università degli Studi di Parma in Parma, with Stefano Cagnoni as local chair. Conference program chairs were Mauro Castelli and Lukas Sekanina for EuroGP, Kevin Sim and Paul Kaufmann for EvoApplications, Arnaud Liefooghe and Manuel López-Ibáñez for EvoCOP and Juan Romero and Antonios Liapis for EvoMUSART. Coordinators were Jennifer Willies and Anna Esparcia-Alcázar and Pablo García Sánchez was Publicity Chair. A total of 116 papers, short papers and late-breaking abstracts were presented in 24 conference sessions plus a general poster session. The opening invited speaker was Una-May O'Reilly, while Penousal Machado delivered the closing keynote.

Amsterdam (2017)

The 20th edition took place on 19–21 April in De Bazel in Amsterdam with Evert Haasdijk and Jacqueline Heinerman serving as local chair. Conference program chairs were James McDermott and Mauro Castelli for EuroGP; Bin Hu and Manuel López-Ibáñez for EvoCOP; João Correia and Vic Ciesielski for EvoMUSART; Giovanni Squillero for EvoApplications. Lukáš Sekanina, Antonios Liapis, and Kevin Sim served as Publication Chairs of the different events. Pablo García Sánchez was the Publicity Chair, while Jennifer Willies, the Coordinator. The invited speakers were Kenneth De Jong and Arthur Kordon. A total of 210 papers were presented: 108 in EvoApplications, 34 in EuroGP, 39 in EvoCOP, and 29 in EvoMUSART.

Porto (2016)

The 19th edition took place between March 30 and April 1 in Seminário de Vilar Rua Arcediago Van Zeller in Porto with Penousal Machado and Ernesto Costa serving as local chair. Conference program chairs were Malcolm Heywood and James McDermott for EuroGP; Bin Hu and Francisco Chicano for EvoCOP; Colin Johnson and Vic Ciesielski for EvoMUSART; Giovanni Squillero for EvoApplications. Mauro Castelli, João Correia, and Paolo Burelli were Publication Chairs of the different events. Pablo García Sánchez was the Publicity Chair, while Jennifer Willies, the Coordinator. The invited speakers were Richard Forsyth and Kenneth Sörensen. A total of 218 papers were presented: 113 in EvoApplications, 36 in EuroGP, 44 in EvoCOP, and 25 in EvoMUSART.