P Systems with Proteins on Membranes

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Păun, Andrei | Popa, Bianca

Affiliations: Department of Computer Science, Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, PO Box 10348, Louisiana, LA-71272 USA. E-mails: apaun@latech.edu; bdp010@latech.edu

Abstract: This work is a continuation of the investigations aiming to bridge membrane computing (where in a compartmental cell-like structure the chemicals to evolve are placed in the compartments defined by the membranes) and brane calculi (where one considers again a compartmental cell-like structure with the chemicals/proteins placed on the membranes themselves). In the current paper we use objects both in compartments and on membranes (the latter are called proteins), with the objects from membranes evolving under the control of the proteins. Several possibilities are considered (objects only moved across membranes or also changed during this operation, with the proteins only assisting the move/change or also changing themselves). Somewhat expected, computational universality is obtained for several combinations of such possibilities.

Keywords: Membrane computing, brane calculus, Turing computability, universality

Journal: Fundamenta Informaticae, vol. 72, no. 4, pp. 467-483, 2006