Related papers: Breaking through the $\Omega(n)$-space barrier: Po…
We design and analyze a protocol for dividing a state into districts, where parties take turns proposing a division, and freezing a district from the other party's proposed division. We show that our protocol has predictable and provable…
The model of population protocols refers to a large collection of simple indistinguishable entities, frequently called {\em agents}. The agents communicate and perform computation through pairwise interactions. We study fast and space…
The population protocol model describes a network of anonymous agents that interact asynchronously in pairs chosen at random. Each agent starts in the same initial state $s$. We introduce the *dynamic size counting* problem: approximately…
We consider \emph{plurality consensus} in a network of $n$ nodes. Initially, each node has one of $k$ opinions. The nodes execute a (randomized) distributed protocol to agree on the plurality opinion (the opinion initially supported by the…
The {\em parallel time} of a population protocol is defined as the average number of required interactions that an agent in the protocol participates, i.e., the quotient between the total number of interactions required by the protocol and…
Population protocols are networks of finite-state agents, interacting randomly, and updating their states using simple rules. Despite their extreme simplicity, these systems have been shown to cooperatively perform complex computational…
Extending well-structured transition systems to incorporate a probabilistic scheduling rule, we define a new class of stochastic well-structured transition systems that includes population protocols, chemical reaction networks, and many…
The \emph{Undecided-State Dynamics} is a well-known protocol for distributed consensus. We analyze it in the parallel \pull\ communication model on the complete graph for the \emph{binary} case (every node can either support one of…
We study probabilistic protocols for concurrent threshold-based load balancing in networks. There are n resources or machines represented by nodes in an undirected graph and m >> n users that try to find an acceptable resource by moving…
We analyze the convergence of the $k$-opinion Undecided State Dynamics (USD) in the population protocol model. For $k$=2 opinions it is well known that the USD reaches consensus with high probability within $O(n \log n)$ interactions.…
We focus on a uniform partition problem in a population protocol model. The uniform partition problem aims to divide a population into k groups of the same size, where k is a given positive integer. In the case of k=2 (called uniform…
We study Plurality Consensus in the Gossip Model over a network of $n$ anonymous agents. Each agent supports an initial opinion or color. We assume that at the onset, the number of agents supporting the plurality color exceeds that of the…
The first chapter concerns monotype population models. We first study general birth and death processes and we give non-explosion and extinction criteria, moment computations and a pathwise representation. We then show how different scales…
Oscillations often take place in populations of decision makers that are either a coordinator, who takes action only if enough others do so, or an anticoordinator, who takes action only if few others do so. Populations consisting of…
What is a population? This review considers how a population may be defined in terms of understanding the structure of the underlying genetics of the individuals involved. The main approach is to consider statistically identifiable groups…
A population protocol stably computes a relation R(x,y) if its output always stabilizes and R(x,y) holds if and only if y is a possible output for input x. Alternatively, a population protocol computes a predicate R(<x,y>) on pairs <x,y> if…
In this article, we show that the now classical protocol complex approach to distributed task solvability of Herlihy et al. can be understood in standard categorical terms. First, protocol complexes are functors, from chromatic (semi-)…
We consider multi-party protocols for classification that are motivated by applications such as e-discovery in court proceedings. We identify a protocol that guarantees that the requesting party receives all responsive documents and the…
In the last two decades, there has been much effort in finding secure protocols for two-party cryptographic tasks. It has since been discovered that even with quantum mechanics, many such protocols are limited in their security promises. In…
We present a first-order theory of sequences with integer elements, Presburger arithmetic, and regular constraints, which can model significant properties of data structures such as arrays and lists. We give a decision procedure for the…