Prof. Javier Esparza's lecture: Black Ninjas in the Dark: Analyzing Population Protocols
About the lecture
Population protocols are a mathematical model of distributed computation
introduced by Angluin et al. in 2004. The original purpose of Angluin et al. was
the theoretical study of systems consisting of identical, cheap mobile devices
with tiny computational resources, like sensor networks. However, since its
introduction, the model has also been used to analyze the behavior of chemical
systems and of people in social networks.
Population protocols help us to pose and study many fundamental questions about
distributed systems: What can be computed by agents wishing to remain anonymous?
Are leader processes necessary for optimal speed? Can macroscopic "phase
transitions" be "programmed" at a microscopic level? Is it possible to check
automatically that a protocol works correctly? Is it possible to automatically
synthesize a protocol for a given task?
In the talk, I will introduce the population protocol model with the help of
several examples. More precisely, I will present the problem of the Black Ninjas
in the Dark, and the different solutions given to it by their Senseis. I will
also show animated simulations of some protocols.
The lecture will be held at Mendel Museum, Refectory of Augustinian Abbey
(Mendlovo nám. 1a, Brno)
About speaker
Javier Esparza is a full professor at Faculty of Computer Science, Technische
Universität München, Germany.
The Chair held by Prof. Esparza develops methods, algorithms, and tools to
locate and eliminate errors in software systems or verify their correctness.
