On the Star Puzzle

Abstract

In the star puzzle, there are four pegs, the usual three pegs, S, P and D, and a fourth one at 0. Starting with a tower of n discs on the peg P, the objective is to transfer it to the peg D, in minimum number of moves, under the conditions of the classical Tower of Hanoi problem and the additional condition that all disc movements are either to or from the fourth peg. Denoting by MS(n) the minimum number of moves required to solve this variant, MS(n) satisfies the recurrence relation . This paper studies rigorously and extensively the above recurrence relation, and gives a solution of it.

GANIT J. Bangladesh Math. Soc.Vol. 39 (2019) 1-14