---
title: "POET (algorithm)"
type: "entity"
entity_kind: "concept"
status: "hub"
canonical_name: "POET"
aliases: ["Paired Open-Ended Trailblazer"]
first_seen: "2026-10-18T00:00:00.000Z"
writer_model: "claude-sonnet-5"
connects_to: ["open-endedness","quality diversity","CoDA (co-evolution of data engines and action policies)","Jeff Clune","Kenneth O. Stanley"]
seek_code_commit: "d40ee39"
---


Paired Open-Ended Trailblazer (POET) is a 2019 open-endedness algorithm (Wang, Lehman, [[entity-jeff-clune|Clune]] & [[entity-kenneth-o-stanley|Stanley]], arXiv:1901.01753, Uber AI Labs) that pairs the generation of increasingly complex, parameterized environments with the optimization of agents to solve them, demonstrated in a 2-D bipedal-walking obstacle-course domain. It is a foundational precedent in the environment-agent co-evolution lineage within open-endedness and quality-diversity research.

Matters to this vault as the lineage CoDA (arXiv:2610.22362, 2026) cites in a single related-work clause — "POET [35] coevolves agents and parameterized environments" — for its own data-engine/policy co-evolution framing. This vault's earlier reading of that citation as a claimed architectural ancestor overstated CoDA's own framing and was corrected 2026-10-20; an independent read of POET's own text, done the same day, confirms the citation's substance is accurate even though its weight was overstated.

## References
- [[claim-coda-shared-memory-couples-data-engine-policy-optimality-preserving-reward-shaping]]
- [[claim-poet-text-confirms-coevolution-mechanism-coda-cites-as-related-work]]
- Captures: 10-inbox/raw/2026-10-18-outside-arxiv261022362-coda-co-evolution-of-data-engines.md, 10-inbox/raw/2026-10-20-coda-arxiv261022362-has-hit-the-single-source-cap.md