AMERICAN INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY-BANGLADESH

CSC3113: THEORY OF COMPUTATION

Lecture: # 5 Week: # 3 Semester: Spring 2022-2023

NON-DETERMINISTIC FINITE
AUTOMATON (NFA)

Instructor: Md. Reazul Islam, Lecturer,

Department of Computer Science, Faculty of Science & Technology.
[email protected] 1
 LECTURE OUTLINE

 Nondeterministic Finite Automata (NFA).

 Running NFA, NFA Tree.
 Formal Definition of NFA.
 Practice, solve exercise of NFA.

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 LEARNING OBJECTIVE

 Understand, learn & practice with example

 Formal Definition of Nondeterministic Finite Automata (NFA)
 Practice designing NFA.

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 LEARNING OUTCOME
ALL OUTCOME ARE REPRESENTED WITH
EXAMPLES
 Understand, learn & formal definition of NFA.
 Practice & Design of NFA

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NONDETERMINISTIC FINITE AUTOMATA (NFA)

STATE DIAGRAM AND THE PROPERTIES OF NFA

 We already know DFA, so it would be sufficient to look into the
differences of properties between the two.
 In NFA a state may have –
 Zero or more exiting arrows for each alphabet symbol.
 Zero or more exiting arrows with the label ε.
 So we can see that, not all steps of a computation follows in a unique
way from the preceding step. There can be multiple choices to move
from one state to another with a symbol. That’s the reason it’s
computation is called nondeterministic.
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RUNNING AN NFA
 If we encounter a state with multiple ways to proceed –
 The machine splits into multiple copies of itself and follows all the possibilities in parallel.
 Each copy of the machine takes one of the possible ways to proceed and continues as before.
 If there are subsequent choices, the machine splits again.
 If a state with an ε symbol on an exiting arrow is encountered without reading any
input, the machine splits into multiple copies,
 one following each of the exiting ε-labeled arrows and
 one staying in the current state.
 If the next input symbol doesn’t appear on any of the arrows exiting the state occupied
by a copy of the machine, that copy of the machine dies, along with the branch of the
computation associated with it.
 If any one of these copies of the machine is in an accept state at the end of the input,
the NFA accepts the input strings.
 So, nondeterminism may be viewed as a kind of parallel computation wherein several
processes can be running concurrently.
 If at least one of these processes accepts then the entire computation accepts.
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 RUNNING AN NFA
 Another way of viewing a
nondeterministic computation is as a
tree of possibilities.
 The root corresponds to the start
of the computation.
 Every branching point in the tree
corresponds to a point in the
computation at which the machine
has multiple choices.
 The machine accepts if at least
one of the computation branches
ends in an accept state.

TREE REPRESENTATION

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SIMULATION – NFA TREE
0,1 0,1

010110 1 0, ε 1
a1 a2 a3 a4
Symbol read
a1
0 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
a1
1 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
a1 a2
0 ----------------------------------------------------------------
a1 a3
1 ----------------------------------------------------------
a1 a2 a3 a4
1 ------------------------------------------------
a1 a2 a3 a4 a4
0 ------------------------------------------
a1 a3 a4 a4
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FORMAL DEFINITION OF NFA
NFA is a 5-tuple (Q, Σ, , q0, F)
Q is a finite set of states.
Σ is a finite alphabet.
 : Q  Σ  P(Q).
The transition function takes a state and an input
symbol or the empty string (Σ=Σ  ) and produces the
set of possible next states (P(Q) is the power set of Q).
q0Q is the start state.
F  Q is the set of accepted states.

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NONDETERMINISTIC FINITE AUTOMATA (NFA)

FORMAL DEFINITION
 Let, the above NFA N1 = (Q1, Σ, 1, a1, F1). 1 in form  : Q  Σ  P(Q)
 Q1 = {a1, a2, a3, a4}.
 Σ = {0, 1}. 1(a1, 0) = {a1} 1(a3, 0) = 
 1 | 0 1 1(a1, 1) = {a1, a2} 1(a3, 1) = {a4}
 1(a1, ) =  1(a3, ) = 
a1 | {a1} {a1, 1(a2, 0) = {a3} 1(a4, 0) = {a4}
a 2}  1(a2, 1) =  1(a4, 1) = {a4}
a2 | {a3}  1(a2, ) = {a3} 1(a4, ) = 
{a3}
Q  Σa =3 {(a1, |0), (a1, 1), (a1, ), (a2, 0), (a2, 1),
{a4(a} 2, ), (a3, 0), (a3, 1), (a3, ), (a4, 0), (a4, 1), (a4, )}
P(Q) = {, {a1}, {a2}, {a3}, {a4}, {a1,a2}, {a1,a3}, {a1,a4}, {a2,a3}, {a2,a4}, {a3,a4},
a4 | {a4} {a2,a
{a1,a 4} 3}, {a1,a2,a4}, {a1,a3,a4}, {a2,a3,a4}, {a1,a2,a3, a4}}
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 10
NONDETERMINISTI
C FINITE AUTOMATA
(NFA)

EXAMPLE

 Let, the above NFA N2 = (Q2, Σ, 2, b1, F2).

 Q2 = {b1, b2, b3}.
 Σ = {0, 1}.
 2 is given as –
| 0 1 
b1 |  {b2} {b3}
b2 | {b2, b3} {b3} 
b3 | {b1}  
 b1 is the start state.
 F2 = {b1}.
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 PRACTICE NFA

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PRACTICE NFA

1. Draw the state diagram of the NFA for the following Languages
over the alphabet is {0, 1}.
a) L={w | w begins/starts with a 0},
b) L={w | w begins/starts with a 1},

2. Draw the state diagram of the NFA for the following Languages
over the alphabet is {a, b}.
a) L={w | w ends with a},
b) L={w | w ends with b},
c) L={w | w contains with b}
d) L={w | w contains with ab}

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B1 ={w : w is a binary string containing an odd number of 1s}.
B2 ={w : w is a binary string containing an even number of 0s}.
∑ = {0,1}
0
1 0

B1 q1 q2

1
1
1 0 1

0
B2 q1 q2 q3

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B3 ={w| w ends with a 0}.
B4 ={w| w begins with a 1}.
B5 ={w| w begins with a 1 and ends with a 0}.
∑ = {0,1}
0, 1
0
B3 q1 q2

1 0, 1
B4 q1 q2

0, 1

1 0
B5 q1 q2 q3

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B6 ={w| w has at least two 1s}.
B7 ={w| w has at most two 1s}.
∑ = {0,1}

0 0 0, 1

1 1
B6 q1 q2 q3

0 0 0

1 1
B7 q1 q2 q3

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B8 ={w| w has substring 101}.
B9 ={w| w has substring 011}.
∑ = {0,1} 0,1

1 0 1
B8 qs q1 q10 q101 0, 1

0, 1 0

0 1 1
B9 qs q0 q01 q011 0, 1
0

What happens for the language, A2 ={w| w does not have substring 011}?

17
B10 ={w| w starts with a 1 and has even length or
w starts with a 0 and has odd length}.
∑ = {0,1}
0, 1

0, 1
1 q2 q3

B10 q1 0, 1

0 0, 1
q4 q5

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 REFERENCES
NONDETERMINISTIC FINITE AUTOMATA
 Introduction to Theory of Computation, Sipser, (3rd ed), NFA.

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