Behavior of lacunary series at the natural boundary (Q734907)

The authors develop a local theory of lacunary Dirichlet series of the form \[ h(z)=\sum_{j=1}^\infty c_j\text{exp}(-zg(j)),\quad \text{Re}(z) > 0, \] as \(z\) approaches the boundary \(i\mathbb R\), under the assumption \(g' \to\infty\) and further assumptions on \(c_j\). For such functions, the authors develop a theory of generalized local asymptotic expansions at natural boundaries, and explore their consequences and applications. The expansions are asymptotic in the sense that they become increasingly accurate as the singular curve is approached, and in many cases exact, in that the function can be recovered from these expansions. The authors show that if \(c_j = 1\) and \(g' \to\infty\), then, in a measure theoretic sense, \(h(x + iy)\) blows up as \(x \to 0^+\) uniformly in \(y\) at a calculable rate. The authors find interesting universality properties in the blow-up profile. In special cases of interest, Borel summable power series, in powers of the distance to the boundary, and, more generally, convergent expansions as series of small exponentials multiplying Borel summed series and power series representations can be determined on a dense set on the singularity barrier. Examples are 1) \(\sum_{j\geqslant1}e^{-zj^b}\), where \(b > 1\), or its dual \(d > 1\), where \(b^{-1} +d^{-1} =1\), is integer; 2) \(\sum_{j\geqslant1}e^{-za^j}\), \(1<a\in\mathbb N\). More generally, if \(c_j = c(j)\) and \(g_j = g(j)\) have suitable analyticity properties in \(j\), then the behavior at \(z = 0^+\), and possibly at other points, is described in terms of Ecalle-Borel summed expansions. Then the analysis leads to a natural, properties-preserving, continuation formula across the boundary. If \(g(j) = j^b\) , \(c_j=1\), \(b = n\), or \(b = (n +1)/n\), \(n\in\mathbb N\), the behavior near the boundary is roughly of the standard form Re\((z)^{-b'} Q(x)\), where \(Q(x) = 1/q\) if \(x = p/q\in\mathbb Q\) and zero otherwise. In general, the blow-up profile along the barrier is closely related to exponential sums, expressions of the form \[ S_N=\sum_{n=1}^Nc_n\text{exp}\left(2\pi ig(n)\right),\quad g(n)\in\mathbb R, \tag{1} \] where \(g'\to\infty\) as \(n\to \infty\). The corresponding lacunary series are in a sense the continuation of (1) in the complex domain, replacing \(2\pi i\) by \(-z\), Re\((z) > 0\), and letting \(N\to \infty\). The asymptotic behavior of lacunary series as the imaginary line is approached in nearly-tangential directions is described by dual, van der Corput-like, expansions. These are simple instances of Borel (or Ecalle-Borel) summed transseries. The authors show how lacunary series are building blocks for fractal structures appearing in holomorphic dynamics. The Bötcher map at infinity of polynomial iterations of the form \(x_{n+1} =\lambda P(x_n)\), \(|\lambda| < \lambda_0(P)\), turns out to have uniformly convergent Fourier expansions in terms of simple lacunary series. For the quadratic map \(P(x) = x-x^2\), \(\lambda_0 =1\), the Julia set is the graph of this Fourier expansion in the main cardioid of the Mandelbrot set.