We study the dynamics of towers defined by fixed points of renormalization for Feigenbaum polynomials in the complex plane with varying order $\ell $ of the critical point. It is known that the measure of the Julia set of the Feigenbaum polynomial is positive if and only if almost every point tends to $0$ under the dynamics of the tower for corresponding $\ell $ . That in turn depends on the sign of a quantity called the drift. We prove the existence and key properties of absolutely continuous invariant measures for tower dynamics as well as their convergence when $\ell $ tends to $\infty $ . We also prove the convergence of the drifts to a finite limit, which can be expressed purely in terms of the limiting tower, which corresponds to a Feigenbaum map with a flat critical point.

We show that the finitely generated simple left orderable groups $G_{\!\unicode[STIX]{x1D70C}}$ constructed by the first two authors in Hyde and Lodha [Finitely generated infinite simple groups of homeomorphisms of the real line. Invent. Math. (2019), doi:10.1007/s00222-019-00880-7] are uniformly perfect—each element in the group can be expressed as a product of three commutators of elements in the group. This implies that the group does not admit any homogeneous quasimorphism. Moreover, any non-trivial action of the group on the circle, which lifts to an action on the real line, admits a global fixed point. It follows that any faithful action on the real line without a global fixed point is globally contracting. This answers Question 4 of the third author [A. Navas. Group actions on 1-manifolds: a list of very concrete open questions. Proceedings of the International Congress of Mathematicians, Vol. 2. Eds. B. Sirakov, P. Ney de Souza and M. Viana. World Scientific, Singapore, 2018, pp, 2029–2056], which asks whether such a group exists. This question has also been answered simultaneously and independently, using completely different methods, by Matte Bon and Triestino [Groups of piecewise linear homeomorphisms of flows. Preprint, 2018, arXiv:1811.12256]. To prove our results, we provide a characterization of elements of the group $G_{\!\unicode[STIX]{x1D70C}}$ which is a useful new tool in the study of these examples.

Let ${\mathbf {G}}$ be a semisimple algebraic group over a number field K, $\mathcal {S}$ a finite set of places of K, $K_{\mathcal {S}}$ the direct product of the completions $K_{v}, v \in \mathcal {S}$ , and ${\mathcal O}$ the ring of $\mathcal {S}$ -integers of K. Let $G = {\mathbf {G}}(K_{\mathcal {S}})$ , $\Gamma = {\mathbf {G}}({\mathcal O})$ and $\pi :G \rightarrow G/\Gamma $ the quotient map. We describe the closures of the locally divergent orbits ${T\pi (g)}$ where T is a maximal $K_{\mathcal {S}}$ -split torus in G. If $\# S = 2$ then the closure $ \overline{T\pi (g)}$ is a finite union of T-orbits stratified in terms of parabolic subgroups of ${\mathbf {G}} \times {\mathbf {G}}$ and, consequently, $\overline{T\pi (g)}$ is homogeneous (i.e. $\overline{T\pi (g)}= H\pi (g)$ for a subgroup H of G) if and only if ${T\pi (g)}$ is closed. On the other hand, if $\# \mathcal {S}> 2$ and K is not a $\mathrm {CM}$ -field then $\overline {T\pi (g)}$ is homogeneous for ${\mathbf {G}} = \mathbf {SL}_{n}$ and, generally, non-homogeneous but squeezed between closed orbits of two reductive subgroups of equal semisimple K-ranks for ${\mathbf {G}} \neq \mathbf {SL}_{n}$ . As an application, we prove that $\overline {f({\mathcal O}^{n})} = K_{\mathcal {S}}$ for the class of non-rational locally K-decomposable homogeneous forms $f \in K_{\mathcal {S}}[x_1, \ldots , x_{n}]$ .

We obtain estimates on the uniform convergence rate of the Birkhoff average of a continuous observable over torus translations and affine skew product toral transformations. The convergence rate depends explicitly on the modulus of continuity of the observable and on the arithmetic properties of the frequency defining the transformation. Furthermore, we show that for the one-dimensional torus translation, these estimates are nearly optimal.

We obtain large and moderate deviation estimates for both sequential and random compositions of intermittent maps. We also address the question of whether or not centering is necessary for the quenched central limit theorems obtained by Nicol, Török and Vaienti [Central limit theorems for sequential and random intermittent dynamical systems. Ergod. Th. & Dynam. Sys.38(3) (2018), 1127–1153] for random dynamical systems comprising intermittent maps. Using recent work of Abdelkader and Aimino [On the quenched central limit theorem for random dynamical systems. J. Phys. A 49(24) (2016), 244002] and Hella and Stenlund [Quenched normal approximation for random sequences of transformations. J. Stat. Phys.178(1) (2020), 1–37] we extend the results of Nicol, Török and Vaienti on quenched central limit theorems for centered observables over random compositions of intermittent maps: first by enlarging the parameter range over which the quenched central limit theorem holds; and second by showing that the variance in the quenched central limit theorem is almost surely constant (and the same as the variance of the annealed central limit theorem) and that centering is needed to obtain this quenched central limit theorem.

We construct an example of a fixed point free Anosov diffeomorphism of the plane, which is not topologically conjugate to a translation.

We consider the finitely generated groups acting on a regular tree with almost prescribed local action. We show that these groups embed as cocompact irreducible lattices in some locally compact wreath products. This provides examples of finitely generated simple groups quasi-isometric to a wreath product $C\wr F$, where $C$ is a finite group and $F$ a non-abelian free group.

Let $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$ be an irrational real number. The map $T_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}}:y\mapsto (y+\unicode[STIX]{x1D703})\!\hspace{0.6em}{\rm mod}\hspace{0.2em}1$ from the unit interval $\mathbf{I}= [\!0,1\![$ (endowed with the Lebesgue measure) to itself is ergodic. In a short paper [Parry, Automorphisms of the Bernoulli endomorphism and a class of skew-products. Ergod. Th. & Dynam. Sys.16 (1996), 519–529] published in 1996, Parry provided an explicit isomorphism between the measure-preserving map $[T_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}},\text{Id}]$ and the unilateral dyadic Bernoulli shift when $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$ is extremely well approximated by the rational numbers, namely, if

$$\begin{eqnarray}\inf _{q\geq 1}q^{4}4^{q^{2}}~\text{dist}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D703},q^{-1}\mathbb{Z})=0.\end{eqnarray}$$

$[T_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}},\text{Id}]$

$\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$

$[T_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}},\text{Id}]$

$$\begin{eqnarray}\inf _{q\geq 1}q^{4}~\text{dist}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D703},q^{-1}\mathbb{Z})=0.\end{eqnarray}$$

$$\begin{eqnarray}\inf _{n\geq 1}q_{n}^{3}~(a_{1}+\cdots +a_{n})~|q_{n}\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}-p_{n}|<+\infty ,\end{eqnarray}$$

$[0;a_{1},a_{2},\ldots ]$

$(p_{n}/q_{n})_{n\geq 0}$

$\Vert \unicode[STIX]{x1D703}\Vert :=\text{dist}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D703},\mathbb{Z})$

$\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$

We consider a certain two-parameter family of automorphisms of the affine plane over a complete, locally compact non-Archimedean field. Each of these automorphisms admits a chaotic attractor on which it is topologically conjugate to a full two-sided shift map, and the attractor supports a unit Borel measure which describes the distribution of the forward orbit of Haar-almost all points in the basin of attraction. We also compute the Hausdorff dimension of the attractor, which is non-integral.

A theorem of Brudno says that the Kolmogorov–Sinai entropy of an ergodic subshift over $\mathbb {N}$ equals the asymptotic Kolmogorov complexity of almost every word in the subshift. The purpose of this paper is to extend this result to subshifts over computable groups that admit computable regular symmetric Følner monotilings, which we introduce in this work. For every $d \in \mathbb {N}$ , the groups $\mathbb {Z}^d$ and $\mathsf{UT}_{d+1}(\mathbb {Z})$ admit computable regular symmetric Følner monotilings for which the required computing algorithms are provided.

In this article, we calculate the Ellis semigroup of a certain class of constant-length substitutions. This generalizes a result of Haddad and Johnson [IP cluster points, idempotents, and recurrent sequences. Topology Proc.22 (1997) 213–226] from the binary case to substitutions over arbitrarily large finite alphabets. Moreover, we provide a class of counterexamples to one of the propositions in their paper, which is central to the proof of their main theorem. We give an alternative approach to their result, which centers on the properties of the Ellis semigroup. To do this, we also show a new way to construct an almost automorphic–isometric tower to the maximal equicontinuous factor of these systems, which gives a more particular approach than the one given by Dekking [The spectrum of dynamical systems arising from substitutions of constant length. Z. Wahrscheinlichkeitstheor. Verw. Geb.41(3) (1977/78) 221–239].

We show that various classes of products of manifolds do not support transitive Anosov diffeomorphisms. Exploiting the Ruelle–Sullivan cohomology class, we prove that the product of a negatively curved manifold with a rational homology sphere does not support transitive Anosov diffeomorphisms. We extend this result to products of finitely many negatively curved manifolds of dimension at least three with a rational homology sphere that has vanishing simplicial volume. As an application of this study, we obtain new examples of manifolds that do not support transitive Anosov diffeomorphisms, including certain manifolds with non-trivial higher homotopy groups and certain products of aspherical manifolds.

Furstenberg has associated to every topological group $G$ a universal boundary $\unicode[STIX]{x2202}(G)$. If we consider in addition a subgroup $H<G$, the relative notion of $(G,H)$-boundaries admits again a maximal object $\unicode[STIX]{x2202}(G,H)$. In the case of discrete groups, an equivalent notion was introduced by Bearden and Kalantar (Topological boundaries of unitary representations. Preprint, 2019, arXiv:1901.10937v1) as a very special instance of their constructions. However, the analogous universality does not always hold, even for discrete groups. On the other hand, it does hold in the affine reformulation in terms of convex compact sets, which admits a universal simplex $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6E5}(G,H)$, namely the simplex of measures on $\unicode[STIX]{x2202}(G,H)$. We determine the boundary $\unicode[STIX]{x2202}(G,H)$ in a number of cases, highlighting properties that might appear unexpected.

We show that for good measures, the set of homeomorphisms of Cantor space which preserve that measure and which have no invariant clopen sets contains a residual set of homeomorphisms which are uniquely ergodic. Additionally, we show that for refinable Bernoulli trial measures, the same set of homeomorphisms contains a residual set of homeomorphisms which admit only finitely many ergodic measures.

We show that any action of a countable amenable group on a uniquely arcwise connected continuum has a periodic point of order $\leq 2$ .

Let $\mathcal {G}$ be a second countable, Hausdorff topological group. If $\mathcal {G}$ is locally compact, totally disconnected and T is an expansive automorphism then it is shown that the dynamical system $(\mathcal {G}, T)$ is topologically conjugate to the product of a symbolic full-shift on a finite number of symbols, a totally wandering, countable-state Markov shift and a permutation of a countable coset space of $\mathcal {G}$ that fixes the defining subgroup. In particular if the automorphism is transitive then $\mathcal {G}$ is compact and $(\mathcal {G}, T)$ is topologically conjugate to a full-shift on a finite number of symbols.

For non-invertible dynamical systems, we investigate how ‘non-invertible’ a system is and how the ‘non-invertibility’ contributes to the entropy from different viewpoints. For a continuous map on a compact metric space, we propose a notion of pointwise metric preimage entropy for invariant measures. For systems with uniform separation of preimages, we establish a variational principle between this version of pointwise metric preimage entropy and pointwise topological entropies introduced by Hurley [On topological entropy of maps. Ergod. Th. & Dynam. Sys.15 (1995), 557–568], which answers a question considered by Cheng and Newhouse [Pre-image entropy. Ergod. Th. & Dynam. Sys.25 (2005), 1091–1113]. Under the same condition, the notion coincides with folding entropy introduced by Ruelle [Positivity of entropy production in nonequilibrium statistical mechanics. J. Stat. Phys.85(1–2) (1996), 1–23]. For a $C^{1}$-partially hyperbolic (non-invertible and non-degenerate) endomorphism on a closed manifold, we introduce notions of stable topological and metric entropies, and establish a variational principle relating them. For $C^{2}$ systems, the stable metric entropy is expressed in terms of folding entropy (namely, pointwise metric preimage entropy) and negative Lyapunov exponents. Preimage entropy could be regarded as a special type of stable entropy when each stable manifold consists of a single point. Moreover, we also consider the upper semi-continuity for both of pointwise metric preimage entropy and stable entropy and give a version of the Shannon–McMillan–Breiman theorem for them.

Let $(G,\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC})$ be a self-similar $k$-graph with a possibly infinite vertex set $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC}^{0}$. We associate a universal C*-algebra ${\mathcal{O}}_{G,\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC}}$ to $(G,\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC})$. The main purpose of this paper is to investigate the ideal structures of ${\mathcal{O}}_{G,\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC}}$. We prove that there exists a one-to-one correspondence between the set of all $G$-hereditary and $G$-saturated subsets of $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC}^{0}$ and the set of all gauge-invariant and diagonal-invariant ideals of ${\mathcal{O}}_{G,\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC}}$. Under some conditions, we characterize all primitive ideals of ${\mathcal{O}}_{G,\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC}}$. Moreover, we describe the Jacobson topology of some concrete examples, which includes the C*-algebra of the product of odometers. On the way to our main results, we study self-similar $P$-graph C*-algebras in depth.