CMPSCI 401: Spring 2008

Syllabus and Course Schedule

Prof. David Mix Barrington

All reading and discussion assignments are from Sipser, An Introduction to the Theory of Computation, second edition.

PART I:  Automata and Formal Languages

Mon 28 Jan L01  Course Overview (0.1)
Wed 30 Jan L02  Basic Definitions (0.2)
Fri 01 Feb L03  Review of Proof Techniques (0.3,0.4)
Mon 04 Feb L04  Deterministic Finite Automata (1.1)
Wed 06 Feb L05  Nondeterministic Finite Automata (1.2)
Fri 08 Feb L06  Regular Expressions and Kleene's Theorem (1.3)
Mon 11 Feb L07  Proof of Kleene's Theorem (1.3)
Wed 13 Feb L08  Non-Regular Languages (1.4)
Fri 15 Feb L09  The Myhill-Nerode Theorem (1.4 plus)
Tue 19 Feb L10  Context-Free Languages and Grammars (2.1)
Wed 20 Feb L11  Pushdown Automata (2.2)
Fri 22 Feb L12  Equivalence of CFL's and PDA's (2.2)
Mon 25 Feb L13  Non-Context-Free Languages (2.3)
Wed 27 Feb L14  Properties of the Context-Free Languages (2.3)
Thu 28 Feb X01  EVENING EXAM (7-9 pm) on Lectures 1-14

PART II: Turing Machines and Computability

Fri 29 Feb L15  Turing Machines (3.1)
Mon 03 Mar L16  Turing Machine Examples (3.1)
Wed 05 Mar L17  Variants of Turing Machines (3.2)
Fri 07 Mar L18  More Variants of Turing Machines (3.2)
Mon 10 Mar L19  Representing Algorithms as Turing Machines (3.3)
Wed 12 Mar L20  Decidable Languages (4.1)
Fri 14 Mar L21  More Decidable Languages (4.1)

SPRING BREAK

Mon 24 Mar L22  The Halting Problem (4.2)
Wed 26 Mar L23  Proving Languages to be Undecidable (4.2)
Fri 28 Mar L24  Undecidable Problems in Formal Language Theory (5.1) (GUEST 
LECTURE)
Mon 31 Mar L25  Post's Correspondence Problem (5.2)
Wed 02 Apr L26  Mapping Reducibility (5.3)
Fri 04 Apr L27  More Undecidable Problems (5.3)
Mon 07 Apr L28  The Recursion Theorem (6.1)
Wed 09 Apr L29  A Definition of Information (6.4)
Thu 10 Apr X02  EVENING EXAM (7-9 pm) on Lectures 15-29

PART III: Complexity Theory

Fri 11 Apr L30  Time Complexity (7.1)
Mon 14 Apr L31  The Class P (7.2)  
Wed 16 Apr L32  The Class NP (7.3)
Fri 18 Apr L33  NP Completeness (7.4)
Wed 23 Apr L34  The Cook-Levin Theorem (7.4)
Fri 25 Apr L35  Some NP-Complete Problems (7.5)
Mon 28 Apr L36  Space Complexity Definitions (8.1)
Wed 30 Apr L37  The Class PSPACE and Savitch's Theorem (8.1,8.2,8.3)
Fri 02 May L38  Logarithmic Space (8.4)
Mon 05 May L39  Reachability, L, and NL (8.4)
Wed 07 May L40  NL Completeness (8.5)
Fri 09 May L41  Circuit Complexity (9.3)
Mon 12 May L42  The NC and AC Classes (9.3,10.5)

Final Exam Thursday 15 May, 1:30-3:30 p.m., room 142 CMPSCI building

Last modified 11 May 2008