Boojum reflector

The boojum reflector is a 180° glider reflector found by Dave Greene in April 2001, winning $100 bounties offered by Alan Hensel and Dieter Leithner. The name is taken from Lewis Carroll's The Hunting of the Snark, referring to the fact that a small 90-degree stable reflector was really what was wanted.[note 1]

Boojum reflector
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Pattern type Stable reflector
Number of cells 60
Bounding box 44×32
Angle 180°
Repeat time 202
Discovered by Dave Greene
Year of discovery 2001

The boojum reflector was both the smallest and fastest known stable reflector, until it was superceded by the rectifier in 2009 and the Snark in 2013.

The boojum reflector produces an unwanted beehive, which is then deleted by a later glider. If the beehive is removed before the latter glider hits it, the glider will leave the reflector. This reaction can be seen in this p226 glider shuttle:

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Notes

  1. 180-degree reflectors are relatively undesirable and have limited use in larger circuitry constructions because they cannot get a glider to wherever it needs to be.
gollark: ++exec -L c-gcc```cint main(int apiohazard, char* *apioform) { char *buf = (char*)main; printf("out: %s", buf); return 0;}```
gollark: ++exec -L c-gcc```cint main(int apiohazard, char* *apioform) { char *buf = (char*)main; printf("out: %s", "Hello World"); return 0;}```
gollark: Yes, I know, it means UB.
gollark: But it does if I pass an ununinitialized one.
gollark: When I use the uninitialized buffer, it won't print anything.
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