All for one and one for all: An O(1)-musketeers generic transformation for rotating robots

Abstract

In this paper, we study the main open question of [Michail, Skretas, Spirakis, ICALP'17], asking what are the families of two-dimensional geometric shapes, drawn on a square grid, that can be transformed into each other by a sequence of rotation operations, none of which disconnects the shape. The model represents programmable matter systems consisting of interconnected robotic modules that perform the minimal mechanical operation of 90° rotations around each other. The goal is to transform an initial connected shape of modules A into a target connected shape B. Under the necessary assumption that the two shapes have identical colour cardinalities on a checkered colouring of the grid, and using at most a constant number of auxiliary modules to trigger the transformation, we prove that almost any pair of such shapes can be transformed into each other within an optimal $O\left(n^2\right)$ rotation operations none of which disconnects the shape.