2026-07-23T21:15:09Z https://drops.dagstuhl.de/oai

oai:drops-oai.dagstuhl.de:25094 2026-02-09T08:06:34Z ddc:004 open_access

Randomized Black-Box PIT for Small Depth +-Regular Non-Commutative Circuits Sumukha Bharadwaj, G. V. Raja, S. Polynomial Identity Testing Non-commutative Circuits Algebraic Circuits +-Regular Circuits Black-Box In this paper, we address the black-box polynomial identity testing (PIT) problem for non-commutative polynomials computed by +-regular circuits, a class of homogeneous circuits introduced by Arvind, Joglekar, Mukhopadhyay, and Raja (STOC 2017, Theory of Computing 2019). These circuits can compute polynomials with a number of monomials that are doubly exponential in the circuit size. They gave an efficient randomized PIT algorithm for +-regular circuits of depth 3 and posed the problem of developing an efficient black-box PIT for higher depths as an open problem. Our work makes progress on this open problem by resolving it for constant-depth +-regular circuits. We present a randomized black-box polynomial-time algorithm for +-regular circuits of any constant depth. Specifically, our algorithm runs in s^{O(d²)} time, where s and d represent the size and the depth of the +-regular circuit, respectively. Our approach combines several key techniques in a novel way. We employ a nondeterministic substitution automaton that transforms the polynomial into a structured form and utilizes polynomial sparsification along with commutative transformations to maintain non-zeroness. Additionally, we introduce matrix composition, coefficient modification via the automaton, and multi-entry outputs - methods that have not previously been applied in the context of black-box PIT. Together, these techniques enable us to effectively handle exponential degrees and doubly exponential sparsity in non-commutative settings, enabling polynomial identity testing for higher-depth circuits. In particular, we show that if f is a non-zero non-commutative polynomial in n variables over the field 𝔽, computed by a depth-d +-regular circuit of size s, then f cannot be a polynomial identity for the matrix algebra 𝕄_{N}(𝔽), where N = s^{O(d²)} and the size of the field 𝔽 depends on the degree of f. Interestingly, the size of the matrices does not depend on the degree of f. Our result can be interpreted as an Amitsur-Levitzki-type result [Amitsur and Levitzki, 1950] for polynomials computed by small-depth +-regular circuits. Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik G. V. Sumukha Bharadwaj and S. Raja 2025 Is Part Of LIPIcs, Volume 360, 45th IARCS Annual Conference on Foundations of Software Technology and Theoretical Computer Science (FSTTCS 2025) InProceedings Text doc-type:ResearchArticle publishedVersion application/pdf doi:10.4230/LIPIcs.FSTTCS.2025.51 urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-250949 https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.FSTTCS.2025.51 eng https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode