Hey All,  I'm currently trying to find a solid masters thesis topic pertaining to some branch of automata theory or related to formal languages. I'm trying to generate some good ideas for what an acceptable topic would be, something ambitious but something doable at the same time. Any suggestions would be very much appreciated!
Automata Theory / Formal Language Thesis Topic
ds.algorithms;automata theory;fl.formal languages;soft question
While I agree with David Eppstein's response in general (and I upvoted it), the emerging field of automata that define biological processes and other natural computing things is a vibrant area.  Getting hired later is not something I can speak to, but you might be interested in taking a look at Artificial Biochemistry by Luca Cardelli, or Efficient Turing-universal computation with DNA polymers by Qian et al.  The first paper is Cardelli's latest attempt to provide formal methods to biochemical processes; the second, a theoretical DNA implementation of a stack machine.