Functional equations and nowhere differentiable functions (Q1312251)

The author considers the system of functional equations \[ f\bigl({x+\nu\over b}\bigr)= a_ \nu f(x)+ g_ \nu(x),\qquad \nu=0,\dots,b-1,\tag{F} \] where \(b\in\mathbb{N}\backslash\{1\}\), \(a_ \nu\in\mathbb{R}\), \(| a_ \nu|<1\), \(g_ \nu: [0,1]\to \mathbb{R}\) are given and \(f: [0,1]\to\mathbb{R}\) is the unknown function. The interest in system (F) is due to the fact that nowhere differentiable functions, such as Weierstraß and van der Waerden functions, can be characterized as solutions of (F). After proving an existence and uniqueness theorem for the continuous solutions of (F), an explicit description of the continuous solutions in terms of their expansion with respect to the Schauder base is given. By using this expansion the author gives a condition which assures that the solution \(f\) of (F) has nowhere one-sided derivative. As an application it is shown that the Weierstraß function \(W_{a,b,\vartheta}\) \((| a|<1,\;b\in\mathbb{N},\;\vartheta\in\mathbb{R})\) nowhere possesses a one-sided derivative if \(| a| b\geq 1\). It is worthwhile to remark that the non-differentiability of such functions is proved without making use of their analytic definition, but only using the fact that they are solutions of (F).