Loops of Superexponential Lengths in One-Rule String Rewriting

Abstract. Loops are the most frequent cause of non-termination in string rewriting. In the general case, non-terminating, non-looping string rewriting systems exist, and the uniform termination problem is undecidable. For rewriting with only one string rewriting rule, it is unknown whether non-terminating, non-looping systems exist and whether uniform termination is decidable. If in the one-rule case, nontermination is equivalent to the existence of loops, as McNaughton conjectures, then a decision procedure for the existence of loops also solves the uniform termination problem. As the existence of loops of bounded lengths is decidable, the question is raised how long shortest loops may be. We show that string rewriting rules exist whose shortest loops have superexponential lengths in the size of the rule.