Add to Google Calendar
Date:  Thu, October 30, 2025
Time:  1:30pm
Location:  Holmes Hall 389
Speaker:  Swarnalakshmi "Janani" Lakshmanan, PhD Candidate (Mathematics), University of Hawai'i at Manoa

(hosted by Prof. Narayana Santhanam (nsanthan@hawaii.edu), College of Engineering, ECE Department)

ECE Graduate Students: This will count towards your seminar credit.

Abstract

Shallit and Wang (2001) introduced the automatic complexity of a word x as the minimum number of states in a finite automaton that uniquely accepts x. Here, an automaton M uniquely accepts a word x if x is the only word of length |x| accepted by M. Quantum automatic complexity, which Kjos-Hanssen first studied in 2017, raises new questions motivated by the unitarity of quantum processes as well as the need for probabilistic measurements. Due to these physical constraints, new measures of automatic complexity are needed. In this talk, we explore several physically-meaningful measures of automatic complexity motivated by the geometric subspace structure of the automata and the associated quantum logic. We also generalize quantum finite automata by considering a family of "immortal" deterministic finite automata that lack dead states.

Biography

Swarnalakshmi "Janani" Lakshmanan is a PhD candidate in mathematics at UH Mānoa working with Bjørn Kjos-Hanssen. She completed her BS in mathematics at Arizona State University, where she studied Lie algebras in control theory. Her current research interests are extremal combinatorics, applied logic, theoretical computer science and ethnomathematics. Janani's dissertation is on the foundations of quantum computing and focuses on quantum finite automata. In addition to math, Janani has trained in Indian classical dance for over 20 years and runs a performing arts academy and a collective of professional dancers.