Leader Election and Shape Formation with Self-organizing Programmable Matter

In this paper we consider programmable matter consisting of simple computational elements, called particles, that can establish and release bonds and can actively move in a self-organized way, and we investigate the feasibility of solving fundamental problems relevant for programmable matter. As a model for such self-organizing particle systems, we will use a generalization of the geometric amoebot model first proposed ini¾?[21]. Based on the geometric model, we present efficient local-control algorithms for leader election and line formation requiring only particles with constant size memory, and we also discuss the limitations of solving these problems within the general amoebot model.