Algebraic Theory of Automata Networks

Book excerpt: Investigates automata networks as algebraic structures and develops their theory in line with other algebraic theories, such as those of semigroups, groups, rings, and fields. The authors also investigate automata networks as products of automata, that is, as compositions of automata obtained by cascading without feedback or with feedback of various restricted types or, most generally, with the feedback dependencies controlled by an arbitrary directed graph. They survey and extend the fundamental results in regard to automata networks, including the main decomposition theorems of Letichevsky, of Krohn and Rhodes, and of others.