A Light-Based Device for Solving the Hamiltonian Path Problem

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel light-based device that leverages the physical properties of light to solve instances of the Hamiltonian Path Problem efficiently for small to medium-sized graphs.

Contribution

It presents a unique hardware approach using light rays and graph-like structures to address a classic computational problem, offering a new physical computing paradigm.

Findings

Successfully solves small instances of the problem.

Demonstrates feasibility for medium-sized graphs.

Operates in reasonable time for certain problem sizes.

Abstract

In this paper we suggest the use of light for performing useful computations. Namely, we propose a special device which uses light rays for solving the Hamiltonian path problem on a directed graph. The device has a graph-like representation and the light is traversing it following the routes given by the connections between nodes. In each node the rays are uniquely marked so that they can be easily identified. At the destination node we will search only for particular rays that have passed only once through each node. We show that the proposed device can solve small and medium instances of the problem in reasonable time.