Real bounds and Lyapunov exponents (Q887687)

A critical circle map is an orientation-preserving \(C^3\) homeomorphism \(f\) of the circle with finitely many non-flat critical points \(c_1, c_2, \ldots , c_N\) \((N \geq 1)\). A critical point \(c\) is called non-flat if in some neighborhood of \(c\) the map \(f\) can be written as \[ f(t) = \varphi(t)|\varphi(t)|^{d-1} + f(c), \] where \(\varphi\) is a \(C^3\) local diffeomorphism with \(\varphi (c) = 0\), and \(d\) is a real number greater than \(1\), called the criticality (order, type, or exponent) of \(c\). This paper studies critical circle maps from the differentiable ergodic theory viewpoint. The maps under study have irrational rotational number, therefore they are uniquely ergodic. A theorem due to Yoccoz formulates that such a map is minimal and therefore topologically conjugate to the corresponding rigid rotation. This implies that the support of its unique invariant Borel probability measure is the whole circle. The main result in the paper reads as follows. Theorem: Let \(f : \mathbb{S}^1 \rightarrow \mathbb{S}^1\) be a \(C^3\) critical circle map with irrational rotation number, and let \(\mu\) be its unique invariant Borel probability measure. Then \(\log Df \) belongs to \(L^1 (\mu)\) and it has zero mean: \[ \int_{\mathbb{S}^1} \log Df d\mu = 0. \] Moreover, no critical point of \(f\) satisfies the Collet-Eckmann condition. The map \(f\) satisfies the Collet-Eckmann condition at a critical point \(c \in \{c_1, c_2, \ldots , c_N \}\) if there exist \(C > 0\) and \(\lambda > 1\) such that \(Df^ n f(c) \geq C\lambda^n\), for all \(n \in N\) and this is equivalent to \[ \liminf_{n\to\infty} \frac{1}{n} \log Df^n (f(c)) \geq \log \lambda > 0 . \] The paper is organized as follows: Section 2 has a review of classical facts about circle maps. In Section 3, it is established the integrability of \(\log Df\) with respect to the unique \(f\)-invariant probability measure, for any critical circle map under certain constraints. The proof of the theorem is given in Section 4. In the remaining sections, the authors discuss an analog result to the theorem for infinitely renormalizable unimodal maps with non-flat critical point. They show an application of the theorem to the ergodic theory of certain Blaschke products.The last section contains a list of open questions concerning both critical circle maps and rational maps of the Riemann sphere.