No label defined (Q4037003)

[For the entire collection see Zbl 0755.00019.] For any \(0<t<1\) and \(\beta>1\), let \(Z_{t,\beta}\) be the set of \(\alpha>0\) such that \(\{\alpha \beta^ n\}<t\) for all integers \(\geq 0\), where \(\{x\}\) denotes the fractional part of \(x\). The particular case \(Z=Z_{{1 \over 2}, {3 \over 2}}\) corresponds to the set of \(Z\)-numbers introduced by \textit{K. Mahler} [J. Aust. Math. Soc. 8, 313--321 (1968; Zbl 0155.09501)] who proved that for every integer \(g \geq 0\), \([g,g + 1 [\cap Z\) contains at most one point and \(\text{card} ([0,x[ \cap Z) \in {\mathcal O} (x^ \delta)\), where \(\delta = \log_ 2 ({1 + \sqrt 5 \over 2})\). Similar questions have been intensively studied but a few results are known. In this paper the author relates \(Z\)-numbers to their expansion to the base 3/2 and improves the Mahler's estimate with \(\delta = \log_ 2(3/2)\). Analogous results for \(\{\alpha \theta^ n\}\), where \(\theta\) is any rational number \(>1\), are also obtained. The methods involve combinatorial properties of the general \(\beta\)-shift \(f_ \beta : x \mapsto \{x \beta\}\) \((0 \leq x \leq 1,\beta>1)\) studied by \textit{A. Rényi} [Acta Math. Acad. Sci. Hung. 8, 477--493 (1957; Zbl 0079.08901); see also \textit{W. Parry}, ibid. 11, 401--416 (1960; Zbl 0099.28103)]. Asymptotic formulas for the number of admissible sequences of length \(n\) in \(\beta\)-expansions are given and the number of fixed points of \(f^ n_ \beta\) is estimated in connection with the \(\beta\)-shift invariant Parry measure.