Partially Ordered Two-way B\"uchi Automata

We introduce partially ordered two-way B\"uchi automata and characterize their expressive power in terms of fragments of first-order logic FO[<]. Partially ordered two-way B\"uchi automata are B\"uchi automata which can change the direction in which the input is processed with the constraint that whenever a state is left, it is never re-entered again. Nondeterministic partially ordered two-way B\"uchi automata coincide with the first-order fragment Sigma2. Our main contribution is that deterministic partially ordered two-way B\"uchi automata are expressively complete for the first-order fragment Delta2. As an intermediate step, we show that deterministic partially ordered two-way B\"uchi automata are effectively closed under Boolean operations. A small model property yields coNP-completeness of the emptiness problem and the inclusion problem for deterministic partially ordered two-way B\"uchi automata.Comment: The results of this paper were presented at CIAA 2010; University of Stuttgart, Computer Scienc

Implications of quantum automata for contextuality

We construct zero-error quantum finite automata (QFAs) for promise problems which cannot be solved by bounded-error probabilistic finite automata (PFAs). Here is a summary of our results: - There is a promise problem solvable by an exact two-way QFA in exponential expected time, but not by any bounded-error sublogarithmic space probabilistic Turing machine (PTM). - There is a promise problem solvable by an exact two-way QFA in quadratic expected time, but not by any bounded-error $o(\log \log n)$-space PTMs in polynomial expected time. The same problem can be solvable by a one-way Las Vegas (or exact two-way) QFA with quantum head in linear (expected) time. - There is a promise problem solvable by a Las Vegas realtime QFA, but not by any bounded-error realtime PFA. The same problem can be solvable by an exact two-way QFA in linear expected time but not by any exact two-way PFA. - There is a family of promise problems such that each promise problem can be solvable by a two-state exact realtime QFAs, but, there is no such bound on the number of states of realtime bounded-error PFAs solving the members this family. Our results imply that there exist zero-error quantum computational devices with a \emph{single qubit} of memory that cannot be simulated by any finite memory classical computational model. This provides a computational perspective on results regarding ontological theories of quantum mechanics \cite{Hardy04}, \cite{Montina08}. As a consequence we find that classical automata based simulation models \cite{Kleinmann11}, \cite{Blasiak13} are not sufficiently powerful to simulate quantum contextuality. We conclude by highlighting the interplay between results from automata models and their application to developing a general framework for quantum contextuality.Comment: 22 page

Two-way automata characterizations of L/poly versus NL

Let L/poly and NL be the standard complexity classes, of languages recognizable in logarithmic space by Turing machines which are deterministic with polynomially-long advice and nondeterministic without advice, respectively. We recast the question whether L/poly \supseteq NL in terms of deterministic and nondeterministic two-way finite automata (2dfas and 2nfas). We prove it equivalent to the question whether every s-state unary 2nfa has an equivalent poly(s)-state 2dfa, or whether a poly(h)-state 2dfa can check accessibility in h-vertex graphs (even under unary encoding) or check two-way liveness in h-tall, h-column graphs. This complements two recent improvements of an old theorem of Berman and Lingas. On the way, we introduce new types of reductions between regular languages (even unary ones), use them to prove the completeness of specific languages for two-way nondeterministic polynomial size, and propose a purely combinatorial conjecture that implies L/poly \not\supseteq NL

Describing Periodicity in Two-Way Deterministic Finite Automata Using Transformation Semigroups

Abstract. A framework for the study of periodic behaviour of two-way deterministic finite automata (2DFA) is developed. Computations of 2DFAs are represented by a two-way analogue of transformation semi-groups, every element of which describes the behaviour of a 2DFA on a certain string x. A subsemigroup generated by this element represents the behaviour on strings in x+. The main contribution of this paper is a description of all such monogenic subsemigroups up to isomorphism. This characterization is then used to show that transforming an n-state 2DFA over a one-letter alphabet to an equivalent sweeping 2DFA re-quires exactly n+1 states, and transforming it to a one-way automaton requires exactly max06`6nG(n − `) + ` + 1 states, where G(k) is the maximum order of a permutation of k elements.