A new class of Ornstein transformations with singular spectrum (Q858484)

\textit{D. Ornstein} [in: Proc. 6th Berkeley Sympos. math. Statist. Probab., Univ. Calif. 1970, 2, 347--356 (1972; Zbl 0262.28009)] constructed a mixing transformation \(T\) such that the only nonsingular transformations that \(T\) commutes with are powers of itself. \textit{J. Bourgain} showed [Isr. J. Math. 84, No. 1--2, 53--63 (1993; Zbl 0787.28011)] that this Ornstein construction led to a transformation which almost surely had singular spectrum. In this paper, the authors consider a generalization of the Ornstein transformation and adapt Bourgain's proof to show that they also have almost surely singular spectrum. A familiarity with cutting and stacking and with Bourgain's proof is assumed.