Essential dynamics for Lorenz maps on the real line and the lexicographical world (Q850172)

The paper studies certain subshifts of the one-sided shift \(\sigma:\Sigma_2\rightarrow \Sigma_2\) on the symbols 0, 1. These subshifts are defined in terms of the lexicographic order \(<_L\) on \(\Sigma_2\). Given elements \(a\), \(b\) of \(\Sigma_2\) whose first entries are 0 and 1, respectively, let \([a,b]\subset \Sigma_2\) be the subinterval of \((\Sigma_2, <_L)\) they define, and \(\Sigma_{a,b} = \bigcap_{j\geq 0}\sigma^{-j}([a,b])\). Given \(a\) as above, define \(\phi(a)\), \(\psi(a)\), \(\chi(a)\) to be the infimum of \(b\) as above such that \(\Sigma_{a,b}\) is, respectively, nonempty, infinite, uncountable. The first main result is a set of recursive formulas for these maps, and the second is showing that the topological entropy of the restriction of \(\sigma\) to \(\Sigma_{a,b}\) is positive for any \(b>_L \chi(a)\). A third theorem establishes properties of the Hausdorff dimension of \(\Sigma_{a,b}\) and of certain related subsets of \(\Sigma_2\times \Sigma_2\). The relation between the sets \(\Sigma_{a,b}\) and of Lorenz maps of \(\mathbb{R}\) (continuous nondecreasing maps \(f:(-\infty,0)\cup (0, \infty)\rightarrow \mathbb{R}\) with \(\lim_{x\rightarrow 0^+}f(x) \leq 0 \leq \lim_{x\rightarrow 0^-} f(x)\)) is developed.