DNA computing by competitive hybridization for maximum satisfiability problem

Abstract

We propose a strategy using competitive hybridization for DNA computing. DNA computing is a means of solving intractable computation problems such as NP-complete problems. In our strategy, each spot on a DNA microarray represents the candidate solution. The calculation is executed by competitive hybridization of two groups of fluorescent DNA strands. One group represents a situation in which constraints of the problem are satisfied, and another group represents a situation in which constraints of the problems are not satisfied. After competitive hybridization of two groups, the spot with only the former type of fluorescent DNA strands hold true solution. We describe the approach to DNA computing by competitive hybridization through SAT problem. The SAT problem is an NP-complete problem in Boolean logic. We also show that our DNA computing can solve optimization problem through MAX-SAT problem. MAX-SAT problem is one of the derivative problems of SAT and it belongs to MAX-SNP-complete and APX-complete.