Restrictions of continuous functions (Q2655784)

This paper deals with various problems concerning the restriction of real-valued functions of a real variable. The authors are concerned firstly with restrictions of functions of bounded variation. In this framework they prove that every continuous real-valued function on \([0,1]\) has a bounded variation on some set of Hausdorff dimension \(1/2\). It is also proven that this is optimal by constructing an appropriate lacunary series whose sum has unbounded variation on every closed set of Minkowski dimension bigger than \(1/2\) and hence on every set of Hausdorff dimension bigger than \(1/2\). The next section deals with restrictions that satisfy a Hölder condition with parameter \(\alpha\in(0,1)\). Next, the authors construct continuous functions \(f\) that satisfy a Hölder-\(\alpha\) condition for all \(\alpha < 1\). The case of monotone restrictions of continuous functions is also considered in the present paper. Some open problems conclude the paper under review. The exposition is elementary and self-contained, not requiring any background material.