Turing machine

Turing machine a mathematical model of a device that computes via a series of discrete steps and is not limited in use by a fixed maximum amount of data storage. Introduced by the British mathematician Alan Turing in 1936, a Turing machine is a particularly simple computer , one whose operations are limited to reading and writing symbols on tape, or moving along the tape to the left or to the right one symbol at a time. Its behavior at a given moment is determined by the symbol in the square currently being read and by the current state of the machine. The theoretical prototype of the electronic digital computer, Turing machines are one of the key abstractions used in modern computability theory, the study of what computers can and cannot do. Appropriate Turing machines have found application in the study of artificial intelligence, the structure of languages, and pattern recognition.

Turing machine a mathematical model of a hypothetical computing machine which can use a predefined set of rules to determine a result from a set of input variables. It is named for the English mathematician Alan Mathison Turing (1912–54), who developed the concept of a theoretical computing machine, a key step in the development of the first computer, and carried out important code-breaking work in the Second World War.