EvoX: Meta-Evolution for Automated Discovery
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Abstract (arXiv)
Recent work such as AlphaEvolve has shown that combining LLM-driven optimization with evolutionary search can effectively improve programs, prompts, and algorithms across domains. In this paradigm, previously evaluated solutions are reused to guide the model toward new candidate solutions. Crucially, the effectiveness of this evolution process depends on the search strategy: how prior solutions are selected and varied to generate new candidates. However, most existing methods rely on fixed search strategies with predefined knobs (e.g., explore-exploit ratios) that remain static throughout execution. While effective in some settings, these approaches often fail to adapt across tasks, or even within the same task as the search space changes over time. We introduce EvoX, an adaptive evolution method that optimizes its own evolution process. EvoX jointly evolves candidate solutions and the search strategies used to generate them, continuously updating how prior solutions are selected and varied based on progress. This enables the system to dynamically shift between different search strategies during the optimization process. Across nearly 200 real-world optimization tasks, EvoX outperforms existing AI-driven evolutionary methods including AlphaEvolve, OpenEvolve, GEPA, and ShinkaEvolve on the majority of tasks.
Key facts. Cited by 45 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Builds on 29 of its 34 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 26 Feb 2026.
Builds on
29 of 34 references.
References · 29
- 2023Self-Refine: Iterative Refinement with Self-Feedbackcited by 3,317
- 2025AlphaEvolve: A coding agent for scientific and algorithmic discoverycited by 763
- 2016Learning to learn by gradient descent by gradient descentcited by 616
- 2023Promptbreeder: Self-Referential Self-Improvement Via Prompt Evolutioncited by 521
- 2025GEPA: Reflective Prompt Evolution Can Outperform Reinforcement Learningcited by 449
- 2023Symbolic Discovery of Optimization Algorithmscited by 423
- 2025Agentic Context Engineering: Evolving Contexts for Self-Improving Language Modelscited by 349
- 2024ReEvo: Large Language Models as Hyper-Heuristics with Reflective Evolutioncited by 266
- 2021Learning to Optimize: A Primer and A Benchmarkcited by 206
- 2023EvoPrompt: Connecting LLMs with Evolutionary Algorithms Yields Powerful Prompt Optimizerscited by 189
- 2025ARC-AGI-2: A New Challenge for Frontier AI Reasoning Systemscited by 171
- 2025Dynamic Cheatsheet: Test-Time Learning with Adaptive Memorycited by 146
17 more
- 2025Optimizing Test-Time Compute via Meta Reinforcement Fine-Tuningcited by 121
- 2024LLM-SR: Scientific Equation Discovery via Programming with Large Language Modelscited by 117
- 2018Understanding and correcting pathologies in the training of learned optimizerscited by 97
- 2026Learning to Discover at Test Timecited by 94
- 2025Mathematical exploration and discovery at scalecited by 66
- 2025Evolving Deeper LLM Thinkingcited by 58
- 2025ThetaEvolve: Test-time Learning on Open Problemscited by 52
- 2025FLEX: Continuous Agent Evolution via Forward Learning from Experiencecited by 51
- 2025Barbarians at the Gate: How AI is Upending Systems Researchcited by 48
- 2024Evolving Code with A Large Language Modelcited by 42
- 2025CodeEvolve: an open source evolutionary coding agent for algorithmic discovery and optimizationcited by 37
- 2025Self-Improving Language Models for Evolutionary Program Synthesis: A Case Study on ARC-AGIcited by 34
- 2025ALE-Bench: A Benchmark for Long-Horizon Objective-Driven Algorithm Engineeringcited by 30
- 2026DeltaEvolve: Accelerating Scientific Discovery through Momentum-Driven Evolutioncited by 23
- 2026PACEvolve: Enabling Progress-Aware Consistent Evolutioncited by 21
- 2025FrontierCS: Evolving Challenges for Evolving Intelligencecited by 19
- 2025Feedback-Aware Monte Carlo Tree Search for Efficient Information Seeking in Goal-Oriented Conversationscited by 6
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Citing papers per year: 2026: 45.
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- 2026CORAL: Towards Autonomous Multi-Agent Evolution for Open-Ended Discoverycited by 38
- 2026ScientistOne: Towards Human-Level Autonomous Research via Chain-of-Evidencecited by 15
- 2026NatureBench: Can Coding Agents Match the Published SOTA of Nature-Family Papers?cited by 9
- 2026AutoSaddler: Automatic Harness Optimization with Durable Updates from Agent Execution Tracescited by 9
- 2026Dream-RSI: Recursive Self-Improvement through Evolving Worldscited by 9
- 2026EurekAgent: Agent Environment Engineering is All You Need For Autonomous Scientific Discoverycited by 4
- 2026Evolution Fine-Tuning: Learning to Discover Across 371 Optimization Taskscited by 4
- 2026Fantastic Adaptive Taxonomies and How to Use Themcited by 4
- 2026Automated Discovery Has No Universally Superior Harnesscited by 4
- 2026PACEvolve++: Improving Test-time Learning for Evolutionary Search Agentscited by 3
- 2026FrontierSmith: Synthesizing Open-Ended Coding Problems at Scalecited by 3
- 2026What Do Evolutionary Coding Agents Evolve?cited by 3
33 more
- 2026Mem-π: Adaptive Memory through Learning When and What to Generatecited by 3
- 2026BenchEvolver: Frontier Task Synthesis via Solution-Centric Evolutioncited by 3
- 2026Recursive self-improvement of AI research agentscited by 3
- 2026Reflection in the Dark: Exposing and Escaping the Black Box in Reflective Prompt Optimizationcited by 2
- 2026SeaEvo: Advancing Algorithm Discovery with Strategy Space Evolutioncited by 2
- 2026SwarmResearch: Orchestrating Coding Agents for Open-Ended Discoverycited by 2
- 2026Autopoiesis: A Self-Evolving System Paradigm for LLM Serving Under Runtime Dynamicscited by 1
- 2026SMCEvolve: Principled Scientific Discovery via Sequential Monte Carlo Evolutioncited by 1
- 2026From I/O to Code with Discovery Agentcited by 1
- 2026"Skill Issues'': Data-Centric Optimization of Lakehouse Agentscited by 1
- 2026AIChilles: Automatically Uncovering Hidden Weaknesses in AI-Evolved Systemscited by 1
- 2026FAPO: Fully Automated Prompt Optimization of Multi-Step LLM Pipelinescited by 1
- 2026The Optimizer Is the Agent: Reasoning-Driven Search across Prompts, Programs, and ML Workflowscited by 1
- 2026Exploit More, Explore Smarter for Budget-Constrained Agentic Searchcited by 1
- 2026CoupleEvo: Evolving Heuristics for Coupled Optimization Problems Using Large Language Modelscited by 0
- 2026SPEAR: Code-Augmented Agentic Prompt Optimizationcited by 0
- 2026EvoDrive: Pareto Evolution for Safety-Critical Autonomous Driving via Self-Improving LLM Agentscited by 0
- 2026EEVEE: Towards Test-time Prompt Learning in the Real World for Self-Improving Agentscited by 0
- 2026Evolutionary Feature Engineering for Structured Datacited by 0
- 2026Autonomous Discovery of Wireless Communications Algorithmscited by 0
- 2026A Vocabulary for Multi-Agent Automated Research Systemscited by 0
- 2026Budget-Aware LLM Discovery via Cost-Calibrated Frontier Utilitycited by 0
- 2026Idea Search: Guiding Tree Search with Ideas to Explore Diverse Scientific Methodscited by 0
- 2026EvoMem: Memory-Augmented Evolution for Code Optimizationcited by 0
- 2026varepsilon-MemEvo: Adaptive Cross-Task Memory Transfer for LLM Program Evolutioncited by 0
- 2026Evolution or Illusion? Rethinking Evaluation in LLM Evolutionary Searchcited by 0
- 2026EvoRank: LLM-Guided Evolution of Multi-Objective Learning-to-Rank Pipelinescited by 0
- 2026Hill Sampling for Test-Time Scaling: A Simple and Better Alternative to Repeated Sampling, Evolution, and Trainingcited by 0
- 2026Harness Learning Enables Generalizable Test-Time Adaptationcited by 0
- 2026HeurEvo: Agentic Evolution of Hybrid Solver-Augmented Heuristics for Time-Critical Mathematical Optimizationcited by 0
- 2026AIM: Agentic Idea Management for Automated Researchcited by 0
- 2026LabBook: Harnessing Experimental History for Efficient LLM-Driven Discoverycited by 0
- 2026A Closer Look at Agentic BBO: Benchmarking LLM Agents for Black-Box Optimizationcited by 0
- 2026A Closer Look at Agentic BBO: Benchmarking LLM Agents for Black-Box Optimization8 Oct 2026
- 2026LabBook: Harnessing Experimental History for Efficient LLM-Driven Discovery30 Sep 2026
- 2026AIM: Agentic Idea Management for Automated Research29 Sep 2026
- 2026HeurEvo: Agentic Evolution of Hybrid Solver-Augmented Heuristics for Time-Critical Mathematical Optimization28 Sep 2026
- 2026Harness Learning Enables Generalizable Test-Time Adaptation28 Sep 2026
- 2026Recursive self-improvement of AI research agents22 Sep 2026
- 2026Hill Sampling for Test-Time Scaling: A Simple and Better Alternative to Repeated Sampling, Evolution, and Training22 Sep 2026
- 2026Evolution or Illusion? Rethinking Evaluation in LLM Evolutionary Search17 Sep 2026
- 2026Dream-RSI: Recursive Self-Improvement through Evolving Worlds14 Sep 2026
- 2026EvoRank: LLM-Guided Evolution of Multi-Objective Learning-to-Rank Pipelines30 Aug 2026
- 2026Exploit More, Explore Smarter for Budget-Constrained Agentic Search24 Aug 2026
- 2026AutoSaddler: Automatic Harness Optimization with Durable Updates from Agent Execution Traces24 Aug 2026
33 more
- 2026varepsilon-MemEvo: Adaptive Cross-Task Memory Transfer for LLM Program Evolution12 Aug 2026
- 2026EvoMem: Memory-Augmented Evolution for Code Optimization11 Aug 2026
- 2026Idea Search: Guiding Tree Search with Ideas to Explore Diverse Scientific Methods9 Aug 2026
- 2026The Optimizer Is the Agent: Reasoning-Driven Search across Prompts, Programs, and ML Workflows7 Aug 2026
- 2026Budget-Aware LLM Discovery via Cost-Calibrated Frontier Utility29 Jul 2026
- 2026Automated Discovery Has No Universally Superior Harness20 Jul 2026
- 2026Autonomous Discovery of Wireless Communications Algorithms20 Jul 2026
- 2026Fantastic Adaptive Taxonomies and How to Use Them17 Jul 2026
- 2026A Vocabulary for Multi-Agent Automated Research Systems13 Jul 2026
- 2026SwarmResearch: Orchestrating Coding Agents for Open-Ended Discovery2 Jul 2026
- 2026Evolutionary Feature Engineering for Structured Data2 Jul 2026
- 2026Evolution Fine-Tuning: Learning to Discover Across 371 Optimization Tasks27 Jun 2026
- 2026NatureBench: Can Coding Agents Match the Published SOTA of Nature-Family Papers?23 Jun 2026
- 2026FAPO: Fully Automated Prompt Optimization of Multi-Step LLM Pipelines17 Jun 2026
- 2026AIChilles: Automatically Uncovering Hidden Weaknesses in AI-Evolved Systems14 Jun 2026
- 2026EurekAgent: Agent Environment Engineering is All You Need For Autonomous Scientific Discovery11 Jun 2026
- 2026EEVEE: Towards Test-time Prompt Learning in the Real World for Self-Improving Agents9 Jun 2026
- 2026EvoDrive: Pareto Evolution for Safety-Critical Autonomous Driving via Self-Improving LLM Agents2 Jun 2026
- 2026BenchEvolver: Frontier Task Synthesis via Solution-Centric Evolution31 May 2026
- 2026"Skill Issues'': Data-Centric Optimization of Lakehouse Agents31 May 2026
- 2026ScientistOne: Towards Human-Level Autonomous Research via Chain-of-Evidence25 May 2026
- 2026SPEAR: Code-Augmented Agentic Prompt Optimization25 May 2026
- 2026Mem-π: Adaptive Memory through Learning When and What to Generate20 May 2026
- 2026What Do Evolutionary Coding Agents Evolve?19 May 2026
- 2026From I/O to Code with Discovery Agent14 May 2026
- 2026SMCEvolve: Principled Scientific Discovery via Sequential Monte Carlo Evolution14 May 2026
- 2026FrontierSmith: Synthesizing Open-Ended Coding Problems at Scale14 May 2026
- 2026PACEvolve++: Improving Test-time Learning for Evolutionary Search Agents7 May 2026
- 2026CoupleEvo: Evolving Heuristics for Coupled Optimization Problems Using Large Language Models7 May 2026
- 2026SeaEvo: Advancing Algorithm Discovery with Strategy Space Evolution27 Apr 2026
- 2026Autopoiesis: A Self-Evolving System Paradigm for LLM Serving Under Runtime Dynamics8 Apr 2026
- 2026CORAL: Towards Autonomous Multi-Agent Evolution for Open-Ended Discovery2 Apr 2026
- 2026Reflection in the Dark: Exposing and Escaping the Black Box in Reflective Prompt Optimization19 Mar 2026
- 2026CORAL: Towards Autonomous Multi-Agent Evolution for Open-Ended Discoverycited by 38
- 2026ScientistOne: Towards Human-Level Autonomous Research via Chain-of-Evidencecited by 15
- 2026NatureBench: Can Coding Agents Match the Published SOTA of Nature-Family Papers?cited by 9
- 2026AutoSaddler: Automatic Harness Optimization with Durable Updates from Agent Execution Tracescited by 9
- 2026EurekAgent: Agent Environment Engineering is All You Need For Autonomous Scientific Discoverycited by 4
- 2026PACEvolve++: Improving Test-time Learning for Evolutionary Search Agentscited by 3
- 2026What Do Evolutionary Coding Agents Evolve?cited by 3
- 2026Recursive self-improvement of AI research agentscited by 3
- 2026SwarmResearch: Orchestrating Coding Agents for Open-Ended Discoverycited by 2
- 2026From I/O to Code with Discovery Agentcited by 1
- 2026"Skill Issues'': Data-Centric Optimization of Lakehouse Agentscited by 1
- 2026Exploit More, Explore Smarter for Budget-Constrained Agentic Searchcited by 1
12 most cited of 18 All 18 (JSON)
- 2026AIM: Agentic Idea Management for Automated Research29 Sep 2026
- 2026HeurEvo: Agentic Evolution of Hybrid Solver-Augmented Heuristics for Time-Critical Mathematical Optimization28 Sep 2026
- 2026Harness Learning Enables Generalizable Test-Time Adaptation28 Sep 2026
- 2026Recursive self-improvement of AI research agents22 Sep 2026
- 2026Exploit More, Explore Smarter for Budget-Constrained Agentic Search24 Aug 2026
- 2026AutoSaddler: Automatic Harness Optimization with Durable Updates from Agent Execution Traces24 Aug 2026
- 2026SwarmResearch: Orchestrating Coding Agents for Open-Ended Discovery2 Jul 2026
- 2026NatureBench: Can Coding Agents Match the Published SOTA of Nature-Family Papers?23 Jun 2026
- 2026EurekAgent: Agent Environment Engineering is All You Need For Autonomous Scientific Discovery11 Jun 2026
- 2026EEVEE: Towards Test-time Prompt Learning in the Real World for Self-Improving Agents9 Jun 2026
- 2026EvoDrive: Pareto Evolution for Safety-Critical Autonomous Driving via Self-Improving LLM Agents2 Jun 2026
- 2026"Skill Issues'': Data-Centric Optimization of Lakehouse Agents31 May 2026
12 newest of 18 All 18 (JSON)
- 2026Idea Search: Guiding Tree Search with Ideas to Explore Diverse Scientific Methodscited by 0
- 2026Evolution or Illusion? Rethinking Evaluation in LLM Evolutionary Searchcited by 0
- 2026Hill Sampling for Test-Time Scaling: A Simple and Better Alternative to Repeated Sampling, Evolution, and Trainingcited by 0
- 2026Hill Sampling for Test-Time Scaling: A Simple and Better Alternative to Repeated Sampling, Evolution, and Training22 Sep 2026
- 2026Evolution or Illusion? Rethinking Evaluation in LLM Evolutionary Search17 Sep 2026
- 2026Idea Search: Guiding Tree Search with Ideas to Explore Diverse Scientific Methods9 Aug 2026
- 2026Dream-RSI: Recursive Self-Improvement through Evolving Worldscited by 9
- 2026Evolution Fine-Tuning: Learning to Discover Across 371 Optimization Taskscited by 4
- 2026Fantastic Adaptive Taxonomies and How to Use Themcited by 4
- 2026Automated Discovery Has No Universally Superior Harnesscited by 4
- 2026FrontierSmith: Synthesizing Open-Ended Coding Problems at Scalecited by 3
- 2026Mem-π: Adaptive Memory through Learning When and What to Generatecited by 3
- 2026BenchEvolver: Frontier Task Synthesis via Solution-Centric Evolutioncited by 3
- 2026Reflection in the Dark: Exposing and Escaping the Black Box in Reflective Prompt Optimizationcited by 2
- 2026SeaEvo: Advancing Algorithm Discovery with Strategy Space Evolutioncited by 2
- 2026SMCEvolve: Principled Scientific Discovery via Sequential Monte Carlo Evolutioncited by 1
- 2026AIChilles: Automatically Uncovering Hidden Weaknesses in AI-Evolved Systemscited by 1
- 2026FAPO: Fully Automated Prompt Optimization of Multi-Step LLM Pipelinescited by 1
12 most cited of 23 All 23 (JSON)
- 2026A Closer Look at Agentic BBO: Benchmarking LLM Agents for Black-Box Optimization8 Oct 2026
- 2026LabBook: Harnessing Experimental History for Efficient LLM-Driven Discovery30 Sep 2026
- 2026Dream-RSI: Recursive Self-Improvement through Evolving Worlds14 Sep 2026
- 2026EvoRank: LLM-Guided Evolution of Multi-Objective Learning-to-Rank Pipelines30 Aug 2026
- 2026varepsilon-MemEvo: Adaptive Cross-Task Memory Transfer for LLM Program Evolution12 Aug 2026
- 2026EvoMem: Memory-Augmented Evolution for Code Optimization11 Aug 2026
- 2026The Optimizer Is the Agent: Reasoning-Driven Search across Prompts, Programs, and ML Workflows7 Aug 2026
- 2026Budget-Aware LLM Discovery via Cost-Calibrated Frontier Utility29 Jul 2026
- 2026Automated Discovery Has No Universally Superior Harness20 Jul 2026
- 2026Autonomous Discovery of Wireless Communications Algorithms20 Jul 2026
- 2026Fantastic Adaptive Taxonomies and How to Use Them17 Jul 2026
- 2026A Vocabulary for Multi-Agent Automated Research Systems13 Jul 2026
12 newest of 23 All 23 (JSON)