New Bounds on the Tile Complexity of Thin Rectangles at Temperature-1

Abstract

In this paper, we study the minimum number of unique tile types required for the self-assembly of thin rectangles in Winfree’s abstract Tile Assembly Model (aTAM), restricted to temperature-1. Using Catalan numbers, planar self-assembly and a restricted version of the Window Movie Lemma, we derive a new lower bound on the tile complexity of thin rectangles at temperature-1 in 2D. Then, we give the first known upper bound on the tile complexity of “just-barely” 3D thin rectangles at temperature-1, where tiles are allowed to be placed at most one step into the third dimension. Our construction, which produces a unique terminal assembly, implements a just-barely 3D, zig-zag counter, whose base depends on the dimensions of the target rectangle, and whose digits are encoded geometrically, vertically-oriented and in binary.