文章基本信息

标题：Shape Recognition by a Finite Automaton Robot
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作者：Robert Gmyr ; Kristian Hinnenthal ; Irina Kostitsyna 等
期刊名称：LIPIcs : Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics
电子版ISSN：1868-8969
出版年度：2018
卷号：117
页码：1-15
DOI：10.4230/LIPIcs.MFCS.2018.52
出版社：Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum fuer Informatik
摘要：Motivated by the problem of shape recognition by nanoscale computing agents, we investigate the problem of detecting the geometric shape of a structure composed of hexagonal tiles by a finite-state automaton robot. In particular, in this paper we consider the question of recognizing whether the tiles are assembled into a parallelogram whose longer side has length l = f(h), for a given function f(*), where h is the length of the shorter side. To determine the computational power of the finite-state automaton robot, we identify functions that can or cannot be decided when the robot is given a certain number of pebbles. We show that the robot can decide whether l = ah+b for constant integers a and b without any pebbles, but cannot detect whether l = f(h) for any function f(x) = omega(x). For a robot with a single pebble, we present an algorithm to decide whether l = p(h) for a given polynomial p(*) of constant degree. We contrast this result by showing that, for any constant k, any function f(x) = omega(x^(6k + 2)) cannot be decided by a robot with k states and a single pebble. We further present exponential functions that can be decided using two pebbles. Finally, we present a family of functions f_n(*) such that the robot needs more than n pebbles to decide whether l = f_n(h).
关键词：finite automata; shape recognition; computational geometry