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We study exact majority consensus in the population protocol model. In this model, the system is described by a graph $G = (V,E)$ with $n$ nodes, and in each time step, a scheduler samples uniformly at random a pair of adjacent nodes to…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2025-11-04 Joel Rybicki , Jakob Solnerzik , Olivier Stietel , Robin Vacus

We consider the \emph{exact plurality consensus} problem for \emph{population protocols}. Here, $n$ anonymous agents start each with one of $k$ opinions. Their goal is to agree on the initially most frequent opinion (the \emph{plurality…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2024-02-12 Gregor Bankhamer , Petra Berenbrink , Felix Biermeier , Robert Elsässer , Hamed Hosseinpour , Dominik Kaaser , Peter Kling

We study the consensus problem in a synchronous distributed system of $n$ nodes under an adaptive adversary that has a slightly outdated view of the system and can block all incoming and outgoing communication of a constant fraction of the…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2018-05-03 Peter Robinson , Christian Scheideler , Alexander Setzer

There has recently been a surge of interest in the computational and complexity properties of the population model, which assumes $n$ anonymous, computationally-bounded nodes, interacting at random, and attempting to jointly compute global…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2022-01-12 Dan Alistarh , Martin Töpfer , Przemysław Uznański

Communication noise is a common feature in several real-world scenarios where systems of agents need to communicate in order to pursue some collective task. In particular, many biologically inspired systems that try to achieve agreements on…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2025-01-03 Francesco d'Amore , Isabella Ziccardi

Population protocols are a popular model of distributed computing, in which randomly-interacting agents with little computational power cooperate to jointly perform computational tasks. Inspired by developments in molecular computation, and…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2017-04-18 Dan Alistarh , James Aspnes , David Eisenstat , Rati Gelashvili , Ronald L. Rivest

We consider the problem of self-stabilizing leader election in the population model by Angluin, Aspnes, Diamadi, Fischer, and Peralta (JDistComp '06). The population model is a well-established and powerful model for asynchronous,…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2025-05-05 Henry Austin , Petra Berenbrink , Tom Friedetzky , Thorsten Götte , Lukas Hintze

We study the problem of reaching agreement in a synchronous distributed system by $n$ autonomous parties, when the communication links from/to faulty parties can omit messages. The faulty parties are selected and controlled by an adaptive,…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2024-05-27 Mohammad T. Hajiaghayi , Dariusz R. Kowalski , Jan Olkowski

A population protocol describes a set of state change rules for a population of $n$ indistinguishable finite-state agents (automata), undergoing random pairwise interactions. Within this very basic framework, it is possible to resolve a…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2018-04-19 Adrian Kosowski , Przemysław Uznański

In population protocols, the underlying distributed network consists of $n$ nodes (or agents), denoted by $V$, and a scheduler that continuously selects uniformly random pairs of nodes to interact. When two nodes interact, their states are…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2020-11-26 Stav Ben-Nun , Tsvi Kopelowitz , Matan Kraus , Ely Porat

Population protocols are a model of computation in which an arbitrary number of anonymous finite-memory agents are interacting in order to decide by stable consensus a predicate. In this paper, we focus on the counting predicates that asks,…

Logic in Computer Science · Computer Science 2022-03-25 Jérôme Leroux

We consider 3-Majority, a probabilistic consensus dynamics on a complete graph with $n$ vertices, each vertex starting with one of $k$ initial opinions. At each discrete time step, a vertex $u$ is chosen uniformly at random. The selected…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2024-10-16 Colin Cooper , Frederik Mallmann-Trenn , Tomasz Radzik , Nobutaka Shimizu , Takeharu Shiraga

We study here the problem of determining the majority type in an arbitrary connected network, each vertex of which has initially two possible types. The vertices may have a few additional possible states and can interact in pairs only if…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2014-05-01 George B. Mertzios , Sotiris E. Nikoletseas , Christoforos L. Raptopoulos , Paul G. Spirakis

We present the first nearly-optimal bounds on the consensus time for the well-known synchronous consensus dynamics, specifically 3-Majority and 2-Choices, for an arbitrary number of opinions. In synchronous consensus dynamics, we consider…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2025-03-05 Nobutaka Shimizu , Takeharu Shiraga

Population protocols are a formal model of sensor networks consisting of identical mobile devices. Two devices can interact and thereby change their states. Computations are infinite sequences of interactions in which the interacting…

Logic in Computer Science · Computer Science 2018-07-03 Michael Blondin , Javier Esparza , Antonín Kučera

This paper revisits a fundamental distributed computing problem in the population protocol model. Provided $n$ agents each starting with an input color in $[k]$, the relative majority problem asks to find the predominant color. In the…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2025-05-06 Tom-Lukas Breitkopf , Julien Dallot , Antoine El-Hayek , Stefan Schmid

In this paper we study population protocols governed by the {\em random scheduler}, which uniformly at random selects pairwise interactions between $n$ agents. The main result of this paper is the first time and space optimal {\em exact…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2021-06-29 Leszek Gąsieniec , Grzegorz Stachowiak , Przemysław Uznański

Population protocols are a model of distributed computing where $n$ agents, each a simple finite-state machine, interact in pairs to solve a common task against a (adversarial) interaction scheduler. This model was intensively studied in…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2026-05-19 Tom-Lukas Breitkopf , Julien Dallot , Antoine El-Hayek , Stefan Schmid

In this work, we initiate the study of \emph{smoothed analysis} of population protocols. We consider a population protocol model where an adaptive adversary dictates the interactions between agents, but with probability $p$ every such…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2021-05-27 Gregory Schwartzman , Yuichi Sudo

We propose a self-stabilizing leader election protocol on directed rings in the model of population protocols. Given an upper bound $N$ on the population size $n$, the proposed protocol elects a unique leader within $O(nN)$ expected steps…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2021-12-15 Daisuke Yokota , Yuichi Sudo , Toshimitsu Masuzawa