arXiv Machine Learning

BEACON: A Bayesian Optimization Inspired Strategy for Efficient Novelty Search

arXiv:2406. 03616v5 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Novelty search (NS) aims to uncover diverse system behaviors through simulation or experiment without requiring a pre-specified scalar objective.

arXiv Machine Learning
Aug 3

Frugal Bayesian Optimization: Scalable Surrogates for Data- and Resource-Limited Discovery

arXiv:2607. 29225v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Bayesian Optimization (BO) is widely adopted for data-efficient optimization in scientific and engineering applications, yet its computational cost is rarely evaluated alongside optimization performance.

By Panagiotis Krokidas, Christoforos Rekatsinas, Vassilis Sioros, Grigorios M. Chatziathanasiou, Efi-Maria Papia, George Giannakopoulos
arXiv Machine Learning
Aug 18

Large Discovery Models: Empirically-grounded Model-Based Open-Ended Search

arXiv:2608. 15669v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Scientific discovery often involves optimising expensive-to-evaluate objectives over vast, structured, and open-ended hypothesis spaces, such as molecules, protein sequences, and computer programs.

By Zhongwei Yu, Yan Song, Xue Yan, Anjie Liu, Xingyu Lu, Yihang Chen, Huichi Zhou, Siyuan Guo, Luoyang Sun, Sihan Chen, Xiangning Yu, Jun Wang
arXiv AI
Aug 6

Out-Of-The-Loop Multi-Fidelity Bayesian Optimization

arXiv:2608. 04113v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Black-box optimization is a ubiquitous problem in science and engineering, often dealing with expensive objective functions with cheaper lower-fidelity proxies available.

By Gustavo Sutter, Hao Wang, Luis Ricardez-Sandoval, Pascal Poupart, Agustinus Kristiadi
arXiv Machine Learning
Aug 27

Gradient-based Sample Selection for Faster Bayesian Optimization

The paper introduces Gradient-based Sample Selection Bayesian Optimization (GSSBO), a method that builds the Gaussian process surrogate on a strategically chosen subset of samples rather than the full dataset. By using gradient information to eliminate redundant points while keeping diversity and representativeness, GSSBO achieves sublinear regret bounds and reduces the cubic computational cost of standard BO. Experiments on synthetic and real-world tasks show that this approach maintains comparable optimization performance while significantly cutting GP fitting time and resource usage.

By Qiyu Wei, Haowei Wang, Zirui Cao, Songhao Wang, Richard Allmendinger, Mauricio A \'Alvarez
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 18

Search at the Cost of Sampling: Nearly-Instant Latent Space Bayesian Optimization

The paper introduces a new Bayesian optimization approach tailored for generative models used in de novo discovery pipelines. By employing a linear surrogate model constrained to a spherical domain—where high‑dimensional latent vectors naturally concentrate—the authors derive nearly closed‑form solutions for both surrogate modeling and acquisition, achieving at least a 100‑fold speedup over existing methods. This acceleration enables Bayesian optimization to be used as a practical drop‑in component in pipelines that previously found it too slow to consider.

By Donney Fan, Colin Doumont, Aleksandra Kalisz, Paul Duckworth, Jacob R. Gardner, Henry Moss, Geoff Pleiss
arXiv Machine Learning
Jul 14

Modernizing HEBO: a robust Bayesian optimization baseline for practical heteroskedastic and non-stationary problems

arXiv:2607. 10669v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Bayesian optimization is increasingly used to guide data-efficient experimentation in chemistry, materials science, and related laboratory settings, but its practical performance depends strongly on how well surrogate-model assumptions match the geometry and noise structure of the underlying objective.

By L. A. Zhukov, E. V. Shaburova, D. V. Antonets
arXiv Machine Learning
Jun 26

Target-Aware Bandit Allocation for Scalable Surrogate Optimization in Chemical Space

arXiv:2606. 26657v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Identifying high-utility candidates from massive discrete spaces under expensive evaluations is a recurring challenge across the sciences, with structure-based drug discovery as a prominent example.

By Mohammad Haddadnia, Yuvan Chali, Abhilash Jayaraj, Constance Kraay, Joana Reis, Felix Strieth-Kalthoff, Haribabu Arthanari