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DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.CPM.2026.24

On Occurrence-Preserving Morphisms

Authors: Kaisei Kishi, Peaker Guo, Cristian Urbina, and Hideo Bannai

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 369, 37th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching (CPM 2026)

Abstract

A morphism is a mapping that transforms words through letter-wise substitution, where each symbol is consistently replaced by a fixed word. In the field of combinatorics on words, one topic that has attracted considerable attention is the characterization of morphisms that preserve specific properties, such as overlap-freeness, square-freeness, lexicographic order, and primitivity. Continuing this direction, we initiate the study on occurrence-preserving morphisms, which address the following fundamental question: given a morphism ϕ, two words u and v, and k ≥ 1, under what conditions does the number of occurrences of u in v equal the number of occurrences of ϕ^k(u) in ϕ^k(v)? To answer this question, we introduce the notion of interference-free morphisms, examine their properties, and uncover a connection to recognizable morphisms. We then present a precise characterization of occurrence-preserving morphisms in terms of interference-freeness. As applications of our characterization, we first show that there exists a bijection between the starting positions of the occurrences of u in v and those of ϕ^k(u) in ϕ^k(v). We then apply the characterization to the Fibonacci and Thue-Morse words to identify their minimal unique substrings (MUSs). Finally, we exploit the connection between MUSs and net occurrences to simplify existing proofs on net occurrences in these words.

Cite as

Kaisei Kishi, Peaker Guo, Cristian Urbina, and Hideo Bannai. On Occurrence-Preserving Morphisms. In 37th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching (CPM 2026). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 369, pp. 24:1-24:16, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2026)

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@InProceedings{kishi_et_al:LIPIcs.CPM.2026.24,
  author =	{Kishi, Kaisei and Guo, Peaker and Urbina, Cristian and Bannai, Hideo},
  title =	{{On Occurrence-Preserving Morphisms}},
  booktitle =	{37th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching (CPM 2026)},
  pages =	{24:1--24:16},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-420-8},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2026},
  volume =	{369},
  editor =	{Bille, Philip and Prezza, Nicola},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.CPM.2026.24},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-259504},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.CPM.2026.24},
  annote =	{Keywords: Property-preserving morphisms, interference-free morphisms, recognizable morphisms, injective morphisms, Fibonacci words, Thue-Morse words, minimal unique substrings (MUSs), net occurrences}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.CPM.2025.16

Net Occurrences in Fibonacci and Thue-Morse Words

Authors: Peaker Guo and Kaisei Kishi

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 331, 36th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching (CPM 2025)

Abstract

A net occurrence of a repeated string in a text is an occurrence with unique left and right extensions, and the net frequency of the string is the number of its net occurrences in the text. Originally introduced for applications in Natural Language Processing, net frequency has recently gained attention for its algorithmic aspects. Guo et al. [CPM 2024] and Ohlebusch et al. [SPIRE 2024] focus on its computation in the offline setting, while Guo et al. [SPIRE 2024], Inenaga [arXiv 2024], and Mieno and Inenaga [CPM 2025] tackle the online counterpart. Mieno and Inenaga also characterize net occurrences in terms of the minimal unique substrings of the text. Additionally, Guo et al. [CPM 2024] initiate the study of net occurrences in Fibonacci words to establish a lower bound on the asymptotic running time of algorithms. Although there has been notable progress in algorithmic developments and some initial combinatorial insights, the combinatorial aspects of net occurrences have yet to be thoroughly examined. In this work, we make two key contributions. First, we confirm the conjecture that each Fibonacci word contains exactly three net occurrences. Second, we show that each Thue-Morse word contains exactly nine net occurrences. To achieve these results, we introduce the notion of overlapping net occurrence cover, which narrows down the candidate net occurrences in any text. Furthermore, we provide a precise characterization of occurrences of Fibonacci and Thue-Morse words of smaller order, offering structural insights that may have independent interest and potential applications in algorithm analysis and combinatorial properties of these words.

Cite as

Peaker Guo and Kaisei Kishi. Net Occurrences in Fibonacci and Thue-Morse Words. In 36th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching (CPM 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 331, pp. 16:1-16:22, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{guo_et_al:LIPIcs.CPM.2025.16,
  author =	{Guo, Peaker and Kishi, Kaisei},
  title =	{{Net Occurrences in Fibonacci and Thue-Morse Words}},
  booktitle =	{36th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching (CPM 2025)},
  pages =	{16:1--16:22},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-369-0},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{331},
  editor =	{Bonizzoni, Paola and M\"{a}kinen, Veli},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.CPM.2025.16},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-231107},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.CPM.2025.16},
  annote =	{Keywords: Fibonacci words, Thue-Morse words, net occurrence, net frequency, factorization}
}

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Documents authored by Kishi, Kaisei

On Occurrence-Preserving Morphisms

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Net Occurrences in Fibonacci and Thue-Morse Words

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