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Limited Automata and Context-Free Languages

Published: 01 January 2015 Publication History

Abstract

Limited automata are one-tape Turing machines which are allowed to rewrite each tape cell only in the first d visits, for a given constant d. For each d ≥ 2, these devices characterize the class of context-free languages. We investigate the equivalence between 2-limited automata and pushdown automata, comparing the relative sizes of their descriptions. We prove exponential upper and lower bounds for the sizes of pushdown automata simulating 2-limited automata. In the case of the conversion of deterministic 2-limited automata into deterministic pushdown automata the upper bound is double exponential and we conjecture that it cannot be reduced. On the other hand, from pushdown automata we can obtain equivalent 2-limited automata of polynomial size, also preserving determinism. From our results, it follows that the class of languages accepted by deterministic 2-limited automata coincides with the class of deterministic context-free languages.

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        cover image Fundamenta Informaticae
        Fundamenta Informaticae  Volume 136, Issue 1-2
        Non-Classical Models of Automata and Applications V
        January 2015
        196 pages

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        IOS Press

        Netherlands

        Publication History

        Published: 01 January 2015

        Author Tags

        1. Descriptional Complexity
        2. Deterministic Context-Free Languages
        3. Finite Automata
        4. Formal Languages
        5. Turing Machines

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