Implementation of Glider Guns in the Light-Sensitive Belousov-Zhabotinsky Medium

In cellular automata models a glider gun is an oscillating pattern of non-quiescent states that periodically emits traveling localizations (gliders). The glider streams can be combined to construct functionally complete systems of logical gates and thus realize universal computation. The glider gun is the only means of ensuring the negation operation without additional external input and therefore is an essential component of a collision-based computing circuit. We demonstrate the existence of glider gun like structures in both experimental and numerical studies of an excitable chemical system -- the light-sensitive Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction. These discoveries could provide the basis for future designs of collision-based reaction-diffusion computers.Comment: Accepted for publication in Physical Review