Narad Rampersad

Lucas Mol, Narad Rampersad, Jeffrey Shallit

We study various aspects of Dyck words appearing in binary sequences, where $0$ is treated as a left parenthesis and $1$ as a right parenthesis. We show that binary words that are $7/3$-power-free have bounded nesting level, but this no longer holds for larger repetition exponents. We give an explicit characterization of the factors of the Thue-Morse word that are Dyck, and show how to count them. We also prove tight upper and lower bounds on $f(n)$, the number of Dyck factors of Thue-Morse of length $2n$.

Delaram Moradi, Narad Rampersad, Jeffrey Shallit

We construct automata with input(s) in base $k$ recognizing some basic relations and study their number of states. We also consider some basic operations on $k$-automatic sequences $(h(i))_{i \geq 0}$ and discuss their state complexity. We find a relationship between subword complexity of the interior sequence $(h'(i))_{i \geq 0}$ and state complexity of the linear subsequence $(h(ni+c))_{i \geq 0}$. We resolve a recent question of Zantema and Bosma about linear subsequences of $k$-automatic sequences with input in most-significant-digit-first format. We also discuss the state complexity and runtime complexity of using a reasonable interpretation of Büchi arithmetic to actually construct some of the studied automata recognizing relations or carrying out operations on automatic sequences.

Delaram Moradi, Narad Rampersad, Jeffrey Shallit

We construct automata with input(s) in Fibonacci representation (also known as Zeckendorf representation) recognizing some basic arithmetic relations and study their number of states. We also consider some basic operations on Fibonacci-automatic sequences and discuss their state complexity. Furthermore, as a consequence of our results, we improve a bound in a recent paper of Bosma and Don. We also discuss the state complexity and runtime complexity of using a reasonable interpretation of Büchi arithmetic to actually construct some of the studied automata recognizing relations.

John M. Campbell, Narad Rampersad

Defant and Kravitz introduced generalizations of West's stack-sorting map $s$ from permutations to finite words. This raises questions as to how such generalizations could be applied in the field of combinatorics on words. The Defant-Kravitz generalizations of $s$ depend on how repeated occurrences of the same character within a word may be repositioned, according to their $\textsf{tortoise}$ and $\textsf{hare}$ operations. As demonstrated in this paper, these operations provide a natural way of extending abelian complexity functions for infinite sequences, in a way that gives light to structural properties associated with infinite words. We apply these new ideas to two famous infinite words: the paperfolding word and the Thue-Morse word. In the case of the Thue-Morse word, we discover an interesting connection to the previous work of several authors, such as de Luca and Varricchio, on the ``special'' factors of the Thue-Morse word. This may be seen as providing a basis for a new and interdisciplinary area linking the combinatorics about the stack-sorting of permutations with the field of combinatorics on words.