3 research outputs found
The Power of Duples (in Self-Assembly): It's Not So Hip To Be Square
In this paper we define the Dupled abstract Tile Assembly Model (DaTAM),
which is a slight extension to the abstract Tile Assembly Model (aTAM) that
allows for not only the standard square tiles, but also "duple" tiles which are
rectangles pre-formed by the joining of two square tiles. We show that the
addition of duples allows for powerful behaviors of self-assembling systems at
temperature 1, meaning systems which exclude the requirement of cooperative
binding by tiles (i.e., the requirement that a tile must be able to bind to at
least 2 tiles in an existing assembly if it is to attach). Cooperative binding
is conjectured to be required in the standard aTAM for Turing universal
computation and the efficient self-assembly of shapes, but we show that in the
DaTAM these behaviors can in fact be exhibited at temperature 1. We then show
that the DaTAM doesn't provide asymptotic improvements over the aTAM in its
ability to efficiently build thin rectangles. Finally, we present a series of
results which prove that the temperature-2 aTAM and temperature-1 DaTAM have
mutually exclusive powers. That is, each is able to self-assemble shapes that
the other can't, and each has systems which cannot be simulated by the other.
Beyond being of purely theoretical interest, these results have practical
motivation as duples have already proven to be useful in laboratory
implementations of DNA-based tiles