The dimension of the boundary of super-Brownian motion (Q2312682)

The authors consider a \(d\)-dimensional super-Brownian motion \(X\) with \(d\leq 3\). It starts from some fixed element of the space of finite measures on \(\mathbb R^d\) supplied with the weak topology. However, largely the case where \(X_0 = \delta_0\), is considered. The process \(X\) takes its values in the mentioned space of finite measures and is continuous. The goal of the paper is to calculate the Hausdorff dimension of the boundary of super-Brownian motion under consideration. It is proved that this dimension equals \(0\), if \(d = 1\), \(4-2\sqrt{2}\), if \(d = 2\), and \((9-\sqrt{17})/2\), if \(d = 3\). The boundary itself is defined as follows: \(X\) has a jointly lower semi-continuous local time \(L^x_t\) which is monotone increasing in \(t\) for all \(x\); there exists \(L^x=L^x_{\infty}\) and the boundary of \(X\) equals \(F = \partial\{x : L^x > 0\}.\) The authors also note that \(F\) is a delicate set as it depends on population behaviour when the population is quite sparse and so is prone to instabilities. Moreover, it is not monotone in the initial mass. This complicates many of the arguments used in the main proofs. The motivation for the study of \(F\) arose, in part, from a natural interest in the interface between visited and unvisited sites in a population. Modulo the obvious problems with interchanging limits, \(F\) may describe the large scale behaviour of the interface between infected and non-infected sites in an epidemic, or the boundary between two competing and coexisting species. Some other interesting motivation is provided.