On small bases which admit countably many expansions

Publication date 20 November 2014

Abstract: Let

q i n (1, 2)

and

x i n [0, f r a c 1 q - 1]

. We say that a sequence

(e p s i l o n_{i})_{i = 1}^{i n f t y} i n {0, 1}^{m a t h b b N}

is an expansion of

x

in base

q

(or a

q

-expansion) if x=sum_{i=1}^{infty}epsilon_iq^{-i}. Let

m a t h c a l B_{a l e p h_{0}}

denote the set of

q

for which there exists

x

with exactly

a l e p h_{0}

expansions in base

q

. In cite{EHJ} it was shown that

m i n m a t h c a l B_{a l e p h_{0}} = f r a c 1 + s q r t 5 2 .

In this paper we show that the smallest element of

m a t h c a l B_{a l e p h_{0}}

strictly greater than

f r a c 1 + s q r t 5 2

is

q_{a l e p h_{0}} a p p r o x 1.64541

, the appropriate root of

x^{6} = x^{4} + x^{3} + 2 x^{2} + x + 1

. This leads to a full dichotomy for the number of possible

q

-expansions for

q i n (f r a c 1 + s q r t 5 2, q_{a l e p h_{0}})

. We also prove some general results regarding

m a t h c a l B_{a l e p h_{0}} c a p [f r a c 1 + s q r t 5 2, q_{f}],

where

q_{f} a p p r o x 1.75488

is the appropriate root of

x^{3} = 2 x^{2} - x + 1.

Moreover, the techniques developed in this paper imply that if

x i n [0, f r a c 1 q - 1]

has uncountably many

q

-expansions then the set of

q

-expansions for

x

has cardinality equal to that of the continuum, this proves that the continuum hypothesis holds when restricted to this specific case.

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