Connectedness of planar self-affine sets associated with non-collinear digit sets (Q2339887)

A matrix \(A\) with integer entries is said to be expanding if all its eigenvalues have moduli strictly larger than 1. In \({\mathbb{R}}^n\), a {\textit{q-digit set}} is a finite set of \(q\) distinct vectors \(D=\{d_{1}, d_{2}, \ldots,d_{q}\}\). \textit{J. C. Lagarias} and \textit{Y. Wang} [Adv. Math. 121, No. 1, 21--49 (1996; Zbl 0893.52013)] proved that there exists a unique nonempty compact set \(T(A,D)\), called {\textit{self-affine set}}, satisfying the set-valued equation \(T(A,D)= A^{-1}(T(A,D)+D)\). The authors examine the digit set \(D=\{0,v,kAv\}\), for \(k \in {\mathbb{Z}} \backslash \{0\}, v \in {\mathbb{R}}^2\), \(\left | \det A \right |=3 \) and \(\{v, Av\}\) linearly independent. By studying the characteristic polynomial of the \(2 \times 2\) expanding integer matrix \(A\) case by case, they show that the planar set \(T(A,D)\) is connected if and only if \(k \in \{-1,1\}\). Two open questions about the connectedness of planar self-affine sets are given at the end of the paper.