Considered a subfield of computational intelligence focused on combinatorial optimisation problems, evolutionary computation is associated with systems that use computational models of evolutionary processes as the key elements in design and implementation, i.e. computational techniques which are based to some degree on the evolution of biological life in the natural world.

A number of evolutionary computational models have been proposed, including evolutionary algorithms, genetic algorithms, the evolution strategy, evolutionary programming and swarm intelligence. These techniques form the basis of several disciplines such as artificial life and evolutionary robotics. This conference intends to be a major forum for scientists, engineers and practitioners interested in the study, analysis, design, modeling and implementation of evolvable systems, both theoretically and in a broad range of application fields. ECTA welcomes both theoretical research and practical applications.

The conference also aims to foster hybrid approaches within evolutionary computation and also involving fuzzy computation and neural computation.