Theoretical aspects of evolutionary algorithms

Abstract. Randomized search heuristics like simulated annealing and evolutionary algorithms are applied successfully in many different situ-ations. However, the theory on these algorithms is still in its infancy. Here it is discussed how and why such a theory should be developed. Afterwards, some fundamental results on evolutionary algorithms are presented in order to show how theoretical results on randomized search heuristics can be proved and how they contribute to the understanding of evolutionary algorithms.