Simulation of a Turing machine on a digital computer

Abstract

The theory of algorithms relies heavily upon the conceptual and theoretical usefulness of the Turing Machine. Recent work by Trakhenbrot has given further support to the hypothesis that "all algorithms can be given in the form of functional matrices and executed by the corresponding Turing Machines." Such a statement does not immediately suggest that all problems should be reduced to their equivalent Turing Machine, but the implication is clear that if certain problems, recognizable as algorithms, do not lend themselves to a solution in a formal logic structure, they may be reduced to a Turing scheme using a suitable strategy. Examples of such problems are revealed in the work by Lusted and Stahl in the problem of medical diagnosis and by Stahl and Goheen in simulation of the operation of biological cell systems.