Splicing representations of strictly locally testable languages Original Research Article

The relationship between the family SH of simple splicing languages, which was recently introduced by Mateescu et al. and the family SLT of strictly locally testable languages is clarified by establishing an ascending hierarchy of families {SiH: i⩾ − 1} of splicing languages for which SH = S1H and the union of the families is the family SLT. A procedure is given which, for an arbitrary regular language L, determines whether L is in SLT and, when L is in SLT, specifies constructively the smallest family in the hierarchy to which L belongs. Examples are given of sets of restriction enzymes for which the action on DNA molecules is naturally represented by splicing systems of the types discussed.