Related papers: Expressivity within second-order transitive-closur…
We compare the expressiveness of two extensions of monadic second-order logic (MSO) over the class of finite structures. The first, counting monadic second-order logic (CMSO), extends MSO with first-order modulo-counting quantifiers,…
We characterise the sentences in Monadic Second-order Logic (MSO) that are over finite structures equivalent to a Datalog program, in terms of an existential pebble game. We also show that for every class C of finite structures that can be…
We study on which classes of graphs first-order logic (FO) and monadic second-order logic (MSO) have the same expressive power. We show that for all classes C of graphs that are closed under taking subgraphs, FO and MSO have the same…
We study the expressive power and succinctness of order-invariant sentences of first-order (FO) and monadic second-order (MSO) logic on structures of bounded tree-depth. Order- invariance is undecidable in general and, thus, one strives for…
We compare the model-theoretic expressiveness of the existential fragment of Separation Logic over unrestricted relational signatures (SLR) -- with only separating conjunction as logical connective and higher-order inductive definitions,…
Order-invariant formulas access an ordering on a structure's universe, but the model relation is independent of the used ordering. Order invariance is frequently used for logic-based approaches in computer science. Order-invariant formulas…
We introduce a new logic for describing properties of graphs, which we call low rank MSO. This is the fragment of monadic second-order logic in which set quantification is restricted to vertex sets of bounded cutrank. We prove the following…
To Rogers (1994) we owe the insight that monadic second order predicate logic with multiple successors (MSO) is well suited in many respects as a realistic formal base for syntactic theorizing. However, the agreeable formal properties of…
Bounded treewidth and Monadic Second Order (MSO) logic have proved to be key concepts in establishing fixed-parameter tractability results. Indeed, by Courcelle's Theorem we know: Any property of finite structures, which is expressible by…
We study the Monadic Second Order (MSO) Hierarchy over infinite pictures, that is tilings. We give a characterization of existential MSO in terms of tilings and projections of tilings. Conversely, we characterise logic fragments…
In the framework of computable queries in Database Theory, there are many examples of queries to (properties of) relational database instances that can be expressed by simple and elegant third order logic ($\mathrm{TO}$) formulae. In many…
We present a method for proving that a program running under the Total Store Ordering (TSO) memory model is robust, i.e., all its TSO computations are equivalent to computations under the Sequential Consistency (SC) semantics. This method…
Courcelle's famous theorem from 1990 states that any property of graphs definable in monadic second-order logic (MSO) can be decided in linear time on any class of graphs of bounded treewidth, or in other words, MSO is fixed-parameter…
MSO transductions are binary relations between structures which are defined using monadic second-order logic. MSO transductions form a category, since they are closed under composition. We show that many notions from language theory, such…
In this paper we describe an approach to constraint-based syntactic theories in terms of finite tree automata. The solutions to constraints expressed in weak monadic second order (MSO) logic are represented by tree automata recognizing the…
We study the Monadic Second Order (MSO) Hierarchy over colourings of the discrete plane, and draw links between classes of formula and classes of subshifts. We give a characterization of existential MSO in terms of projections of tilings,…
It is well known that MTL with integer endpoints is unable to express all of monadic first-order logic of order and metric (FO(<,+1)). Indeed, MTL is unable to express the counting modalities $C_n$ that assert a properties holds $n$ times…
We extend first-order logic with counting by a new operator that allows it to formalise a limited form of recursion which can be evaluated in logarithmic space. The resulting logic LREC has a data complexity in LOGSPACE, and it defines…
Our main contributions can be divided in three parts: (1) Fixpoint extensions of first-order logic: we give a precise syntactic and semantic characterization of the relationship between $\mathrm{FO(TC^1)}$ and $\mathrm{FO(LFP)}$; (2)…
This paper introduces an abstract notion of fragments of monadic second-order logic. This concept is based on purely syntactic closure properties. We show that over finite words, every logical fragment defines a lattice of languages with…