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We extend a theorem of the second author on the $L^q$-dimensions of dynamically driven self-similar measures from the real line to arbitrary dimension. Our approach provides a novel, simpler proof even in the one-dimensional case. As consequences, we show that, under mild separation conditions, the $L^q$-dimensions of homogeneous self-similar measures in $\mathbb{R}^d$ take the expected values, and we derive higher rank slicing theorems in the spirit of Furstenberg's slicing conjecture., Comment: 43 pages, no figures

Let $\nu$ be a self similar measure on $\mathbb{R}^d$, $d\geq 2$, and let $\pi$ be an orthogonal projection onto a $k$-dimensional subspace. We formulate a criterion on the action of the group generated by the orthogonal parts of the IFS on $\pi$, and show that it ensures the dimension of $\pi \nu$ is preserved; this significantly refines previous results by Hochman-Shmerkin (2012) and Falconer-Jin (2014), and is sharp for projections to lines and hyperplanes. A key ingredient in the proof is an application of a restricted projection theorem of Gan-Guo-Wang (2024)., Comment: 19 pages

We prove inverse theorems for the size of sumsets and the $L^q$ norms of convolutions in the discretized setting, extending to arbitrary dimension an earlier result of the author in the line. These results have applications to the dimensions of dynamical self-similar sets and measures, and to the higher dimensional fractal uncertainty principle. The proofs are based on a structure theorem for the entropy of convolution powers due to M.~Hochman., Comment: 19 pages. v3: many corrections and clarifications, incorporates referees' comments, main results unchanged

Let $\lbrace f_i(x)=s_i \cdot x+t_i \rbrace$ be a self-similar IFS on $\mathbb{R}$ and let $\beta >1$ be a Pisot number. We prove that if $\frac{\log |s_i|}{\log \beta}\notin \mathbb{Q}$ for some $i$ then for every $C^1$ diffeomorphism $g$ and every non-atomic self similar measure $\mu$, the measure $g\mu$ is supported on numbers that are normal in base $\beta$., Comment: This article supersedes arXiv:2107.02699

We survey the history and recent developments around two decades-old problems that continue to attract a great deal of interest: the slicing $\times 2$, $\times 3$ conjecture of H. Furstenberg in ergodic theory, and the distance set problem in geometric measure theory introduced by K. Falconer. We discuss some of the ideas behind our solution of Furstenberg's slicing conjecture, and recent progress in Falconer's problem. While these two problems are on the surface rather different, we emphasize some common themes in our approach: analyzing fractals through a combinatorial description in terms of ``branching numbers'', and viewing the problems through a ``multiscale projection'' lens., Comment: 25 pages, submitted to the Proceedings ofthe ICM 2022

We show that non-trivial $\times N$-invariant sets in $[0,1]^d$, such as the Sierpi\'{n}ski carpet and the Sierpi\'{n}ski sponge, are tube-null, that is, they can be covered by a union of tubular neighbourhoods of lines of arbitrarily small total volume. This introduces a new class of tube-null sets of dimension strictly between $d-1$ and $d$. We utilize ergodic-theoretic methods to decompose the set into finitely many parts, each of which projects onto a set of Hausdorff dimension less than $1$ in some direction. We also discuss coverings by tubes for other self-similar sets, and present various applications., Comment: 24 pages, 2 figures

We present a self-contained proof of a formula for the $L^q$ dimensions of self-similar measures on the real line under exponential separation (up to the proof of an inverse theorem for the $L^q$ norm of convolutions). This is a special case of a more general result of the author from [Shmerkin, Pablo. On Furstenberg's intersection conjecture, self-similar measures, and the $L^q$ norms of convolutions. Ann. of Math., 2019], and one of the goals of this survey is to present the ideas in a simpler, but important, setting. We also review some applications of the main result to the study of Bernoulli convolutions and intersections of self-similar Cantor sets., Comment: 33 pages, no figures. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1609.07802

R. Kaufman and M. Tsujii proved that the Fourier transform of self-similar measures has a power decay outside of a sparse set of frequencies. We present a version of this result for homogeneous self-similar measures, with quantitative estimates, and derive several applications: (1) non-linear smooth images of homogeneous self-similar measures have a power Fourier decay, (2) convolving with a homogeneous self-similar measure increases correlation dimension by a quantitative amount, (3) the dimension and Frostman exponent of (biased) Bernoulli convolutions tend to $1$ as the contraction ratio tends to $1$, at an explicit quantitative rate., Comment: 15 pages

We prove that self-similar measures on the real line are absolutely continuous for almost all parameters in the super-critical region, in particular confirming a conjecture of S-M. Ngai and Y. Wang. While recently there has been much progress in understanding absolute continuity for homogeneous self-similar measures, this is the first improvement over the classical transversality method in the general (non-homogeneous) case. In the course of the proof, we establish new results on the dimension and Fourier decay of a class of random self-similar measures., Comment: v3: the statement of Theorem 1.3 was changed (the selection measure for the "model" of a random self-similar measure is assumed to be Bernoulli rather than an arbitrary ergodic shift-invariant measure; this was implicitly used in the proof. The original formulation is still correct; see the footnote on p.8 for details). The main result: Theorem 1.1 is unchanged

We study a class of measures on the real line with a kind of self-similar structure, which we call dynamically driven self-similar measures, and contain proper self-similar measures such as Bernoulli convolutions as special cases. Our main result gives an expression for the $L^q$-dimensions of such dynamically driven self-similar measures, under certain conditions. As an application, we settle Furstenberg's long-standing conjecture on the dimension of the intersections of $\times p$ and $\times q$-invariant sets. Among several other applications, we also show that Bernoulli convolutions have an $L^q$ density for all finite $q$, outside of a zero-dimensional set of exceptions. The proof of the main result is inspired by M. Hochman's approach to the dimensions of self-similar measures and his inverse theorem for entropy. Our method can be seen as an extension of Hochman's theory from entropy to $L^q$ norms, and likewise relies on an inverse theorem for the decay of $L^q$ norms of discrete measures under convolution. This central piece of our approach may be of independent interest, and is an application of well-known methods and results in additive combinatorics: the asymmetric version of the Balog-Szemer\'{e}di-Gowers Theorem due to Tao-Vu, and some constructions of Bourgain., Comment: 68 pages. v2: many small fixes, main results unchanged. v3: incorporates referees' suggestions, added further details to some proofs. To appear in Annals of Math

We obtain box-counting estimates for the pinned distance sets of (dense subsets of) planar discrete Ahlfors-regular sets of exponent $s>1$. As a corollary, we improve upon a recent result of Orponen, by showing that if $A$ is Ahlfors-regular of dimension $s>1$, then almost all pinned distance sets of $A$ have lower box-counting dimension $1$. We also show that if $A,B\subset\mathbb{R}^2$ have Hausdorff dimension $>1$ and $A$ is Ahlfors-regular, then the set of distances between $A$ and $B$ has modified lower box-counting dimension $1$, which taking $B=A$ improves Orponen's result in a different direction, by lowering packing dimension to modified lower box-counting dimension. The proofs involve ergodic-theoretic ideas, relying on the theory of CP-processes and projections., Comment: 22 pages, no figures. v2: added Corollary 1.5 on box dimension of pinned distance sets. v3: numerous fixes and clarifications based on referee reports

Under mild conditions we show that the affinity dimension of a planar self-affine set is equal to the supremum of the Lyapunov dimensions of self-affine measures supported on self-affine proper subsets of the original set. These self-affine subsets may be chosen so as to have stronger separation properties and in such a way that the linear parts of their affinities are positive matrices. Combining this result with some recent breakthroughs in the study of self-affine measures and their associated Furstenberg measures, we obtain new criteria under which the Hausdorff dimension of a self-affine set equals its affinity dimension. For example, applying recent results of B\'{a}r\'{a}ny, Hochman-Solomyak and Rapaport, we provide new explicit examples of self-affine sets whose Hausdorff dimension equals its affinity dimension, and for which the linear parts do not satisfy any domination assumptions., Comment: v3: added several examples and figures, corrected statement of Proposition 7.2. v2: Added some new examples to show that the SOSC cannot be relaxed to the OSC in Theorems 1.2 and 1.3. Applications of some results of Hochman-Solomyak have been updated to more accurately reflect the form which those results take in Hochman and Solomyak's recent preprint. Minor additional typographical fixes

We prove preservation of $L^q$ dimensions (for $1

We prove that complex Bernoulli convolutions are absolutely continuous in the supercritical parameter region, outside of an exceptional set of parameters of zero Hausdorff dimension. Similar results are also obtained in the biased case, and for other parametrized families of self-similar sets and measures in the complex plane, extending earlier results., Comment: 22 pages, no figures

In recent years there has been much interest -and progress- in understanding projections of many concrete fractals sets and measures. The general goal is to be able to go beyond general results such as Marstrand's Theorem, and quantify the size of every projection - or at least every projection outside some very small set. This article surveys some of these results and the techniques that were developed to obtain them, focusing on linear projections of planar self-similar sets and measures., Comment: 21 pages, 1 figure

We define a class of random measures, spatially independent martingales, which we view as a natural generalisation of the canonical random discrete set, and which includes as special cases many variants of fractal percolation and Poissonian cut-outs. We pair the random measures with deterministic families of parametrised measures $\{\eta_t\}_t$, and show that under some natural checkable conditions, a.s. the total measure of the intersections is H\"older continuous as a function of $t$. This continuity phenomenon turns out to underpin a large amount of geometric information about these measures, allowing us to unify and substantially generalize a large number of existing results on the geometry of random Cantor sets and measures, as well as obtaining many new ones. Among other things, for large classes of random fractals we establish (a) very strong versions of the Marstrand-Mattila projection and slicing results, as well as dimension conservation, (b) slicing results with respect to algebraic curves and self-similar sets, (c) smoothness of convolutions of measures, including self-convolutions, and nonempty interior for sumsets, (d) rapid Fourier decay. Among other applications, we obtain an answer to a question of I. {\L}aba in connection to the restriction problem for fractal measures., Comment: 96 pages, 5 figures. v4: The definition of the metric changed in Section 8. Polishing notation and other small changes. All main results unchanged

We show that in many parametrized families of self-similar measures, their projections, and their convolutions, the set of parameters for which the measure fails to be absolutely continuous is very small - of co-dimension at least one in parameter space. This complements an active line of research concerning similar questions for dimension. Moreover, we establish some regularity of the density outside this small exceptional set, which applies in particular to Bernoulli convolutions; along the way, we prove some new results about the dimensions of self-similar measures and the absolute continuity of the convolution of two measures. As a concrete application, we obtain a very strong version of Marstrand's projection theorem for planar self-similar sets., Comment: 33 pages, no figures

We consider the dimensions of a family of self-affine sets related to the Bedford-McMullen carpets. In particular, we fix a Bedford-McMullen system and then randomise the translation vectors with the stipulation that the column structure is preserved. As such, we maintain one of the key features in the Bedford-McMullen set up in that alignment causes the dimensions to drop from the affinity dimension. We compute the Hausdorff, packing and box dimensions outside of a small set of exceptional translations, and also for some explicit translations even in the presence of overlapping. Our results rely on, and can be seen as a partial extension of, M. Hochman's recent work on the dimensions of self-similar sets and measures., Comment: 17 pages, 5 figures, to appear in Ergodic Th. Dynam. Syst

We employ the ergodic theoretic machinery of scenery flows to address classical geometric measure theoretic problems on Euclidean spaces. Our main results include a sharp version of the conical density theorem, which we show to be closely linked to rectifiability. Moreover, we show that the dimension theory of measure-theoretical porosity can be reduced back to its set-theoretic version, that Hausdorff and packing dimensions yield the same maximal dimension for porous and even mean porous measures, and that extremal measures exist and can be chosen to satisfy a generalized notion of self-similarity. These are sharp general formulations of phenomena that had been earlier found to hold in a number of special cases., Comment: v3: 30 pages, 2 figures, fixed typos and minor errors, to appear in Proc. London Math. Soc

We expand the ergodic theory developed by Furstenberg and Hochman on dynamical systems that are obtained from magnifications of measures. We prove that any fractal distribution in the sense of Hochman is generated by a uniformly scaling measure, which provides a converse to a regularity theorem on the structure of distributions generated by the scenery flow. We further show that the collection of fractal distributions is closed under the weak topology and, moreover, is a Poulsen simplex, that is, extremal points are dense. We apply these to show that a Baire generic measure is as far as possible from being uniformly scaling: at almost all points, it has all fractal distributions as tangent distributions., Comment: v2: 28 pages, 2 figures, fixed typos and minor errors, to appear in J. London Math. Soc

The pressure function $P(A, s)$ plays a fundamental role in the calculation of the dimension of "typical" self-affine sets, where $A=(A_1,\ldots, A_k)$ is the family of linear mappings in the corresponding generating iterated function system. We prove that this function depends continuously on $A$. As a consequence, we show that the dimension of "typical" self-affine sets is a continuous function of the defining maps. This resolves a folklore open problem in the community of fractal geometry. Furthermore we extend the continuity result to more general sub-additive pressure functions generated by the norm of matrix products or generalized singular value functions for matrix cocycles, and obtain applications on the continuity of equilibrium measures and the Lyapunov spectrum of matrix cocycles., Comment: 24 pages. v2: minor improvements, incorporates referee suggestions

The affinity dimension is a number associated to an iterated function system of affine maps, which is fundamental in the study of the fractal dimensions of self-affine sets. De-Jun Feng and the author recently solved a folklore open problem, by proving that the affinity dimension is a continuous function of the defining maps. The proof also yields the continuity of a topological pressure arising in the study of random matrix products. I survey the definition, motivation and main properties of the affinity dimension and the associated SVF topological pressure, and give a proof of their continuity in the special case of ambient dimension two., Comment: 15 pages, no figures

We prove that the set of exceptional $\lambda\in (1/2,1)$ such that the associated Bernoulli convolution is singular has zero Hausdorff dimension, and likewise for biased Bernoulli convolutions, with the exceptional set independent of the bias. This improves previous results by Erd\"os, Kahane, Solomyak, Peres and Schlag, and Hochman. A theorem of this kind is also obtained for convolutions of homogeneous self-similar measures. The proofs are very short, and rely on old and new results on the dimensions of self-similar measures and their convolutions, and the decay of their Fourier transform., Comment: To appear in GAFA. 13 pages

We give a fractal-geometric condition for a measure on [0,1] to be supported on points x that are normal in base n, i.e. such that the sequence x,nx,n^2 x,... equidistributes modulo 1. This condition is robust under C^1 coordinate changes, and it applies also when n is a Pisot number and equidistribution is understood with respect to the beta-map and Parry measure. As applications we obtain new results (and strengthen old ones) about the prevalence of normal numbers in fractal sets, and new results on measure rigidity, specifically completing Host's theorem to multiplicatively independent integers and proving a Rudolph-Johnson-type theorem for certain pairs of beta transformations., Comment: 46 pages. v3: minor corrections and elaborations

We present a general approach to the study of the local distribution of measures on Euclidean spaces, based on local entropy averages. As concrete applications, we unify, generalize, and simplify a number of recent results on local homogeneity, porosity and conical densities of measures., Comment: v2: 23 pages, 6 figures. Updated references. Accepted to J. London Math. Soc

Porosity and dimension are two useful, but different, concepts that quantify the size of fractal sets and measures. An active area of research concerns understanding the relationship between these two concepts. In this article we will survey the various notions of porosity of sets and measures that have been proposed, and how they relate to dimension. Along the way, we will introduce the idea of local entropy averages, which arose in a different context, and was then applied to obtain a bound for the dimension of mean porous measures., Comment: 23 pages, 1 figure

Let $\nu_\lambda^p$ be the distribution of the random series $\sum_{n=1}^\infty i_n \lambda^n$, where $i_n$ is a sequence of i.i.d. random variables taking the values 0,1 with probabilities $p,1-p$. These measures are the well-known (biased) Bernoulli convolutions. In this paper we study the multifractal spectrum of $\nu_\lambda^p$ for typical $\lambda$. Namely, we investigate the size of the sets \[ \Delta_{\lambda,p}(\alpha) = \left\{x\in\R: \lim_{r\searrow 0} \frac{\log \nu_\lambda^p(B(x,r))}{\log r} =\alpha\right\}. \] Our main results highlight the fact that for almost all, and in some cases all, $\lambda$ in an appropriate range, $\Delta_{\lambda,p}(\alpha)$ is nonempty and, moreover, has positive Hausdorff dimension, for many values of $\alpha$. This happens even in parameter regions for which $\nu_\lambda^p$ is typically absolutely continuous., Comment: 24 pages, 2 figures

Using probabilistic ideas, we prove that the packing dimension of a mean porous measure is strictly smaller than the dimension of the ambient space. Moreover, we give an explicit bound for the packing dimension, which is asymptotically sharp in the case of small porosity. This result was stated in [D. B. Beliaev and S. K. Smirnov, "On dimension of porous measures", Math. Ann. 323 (2002) 123-141], but the proof given there is not correct. We also give estimates on the dimension of weakly mean porous measures, which improve another result of Beliaev and Smirnov., Comment: 21 pages, 2 figures

We show that for families of measures on Euclidean space which satisfy an ergodic-theoretic form of "self-similarity" under the operation of re-scaling, the dimension of linear images of the measure behaves in a semi-continuous way. We apply this to prove the following conjecture of Furstenberg: Let m,n be integers which are not powers of the same integer, and let X,Y be closed subsets of the unit interval which are invariant, respectively, under times-m mod 1 and times-n mod 1. Then, for any non-zero t: dim(X+tY)=min{1,dim(X)+dim(Y)}. A similar result holds for invariant measures, and gives a simple proof of the Rudolph-Johnson theorem. Our methods also apply to many other classes of conformal fractals and measures. As another application, we extend and unify Results of Peres, Shmerkin and Nazarov, and of Moreira, concerning projections of products self-similar measures and Gibbs measures on regular Cantor sets. We show that under natural irreducibility assumptions on the maps in the IFS, the image measure has the maximal possible dimension under any linear projection other than the coordinate projections. We also present applications to Bernoulli convolutions and to the images of fractal measures under differentiable maps., Comment: 55 pages. Version 2: Corrected an error in proof Thm. 4.3; some new references; various small corrections

Denote by $\mu_a$ the distribution of the random sum $(1-a) \sum_{j=0}^\infty \omega_j a^j$, where $P(\omega_j=0)=P(\omega_j=1)=1/2$ and all the choices are independent. For $01$ and $\log (1/3) /\log (1/4)$ is irrational.

We study the orthogonal projections of a large class of self-affine carpets, which contains the carpets of Bedford and McMullen as special cases. Our main result is that if $\Lambda$ is such a carpet, and certain natural irrationality conditions hold, then every orthogonal projection of $\Lambda$ in a non-principal direction has Hausdorff dimension $\min(\gamma,1)$, where $\gamma$ is the Hausdorff dimension of $\Lambda$. This generalizes a recent result of Peres and Shmerkin on sums of Cantor sets., Comment: 20 pages. Some minor errors have been corrected and a few points have been clarified

We present a complete proof of a theorem of C.G. Moreira. Under mild checkable conditions, the theorem asserts that the Hausdorff dimension of the arithmetic sum of two dynamically defined Cantor subsets of the real line, equals either the sum of the dimensions or 1, whichever is smaller., Comment: 15 pages. Expository notes, will not be submitted

We compute the Minkowski dimension for a family of self-affine sets on the plane. Our result holds for every (rather than generic) set in the class. Moreover, we exhibit explicit open subsets of this class where we allow overlapping, and do not impose any conditions on the norms of the linear maps. The family under consideration was inspired by the theory of Kakeya sets., Comment: 27 pages, 1 figure. Submitted October 2007

Let $C_a$ be the central Cantor set obtained by removing a central interval of length $1-2a$ from the unit interval, and continuing this process inductively on each of the remaining two intervals. We prove that if $\log b/\log a$ is irrational, then \[ \dim(C_a+C_b) = \min(\dim(C_a) + \dim(C_b),1), \] where $\dim$ is Hausdorff dimension. More generally, given two self-similar sets $K,K'$ in $\RR$ and a scaling parameter $s>0$, if the dimension of the arithmetic sum $K+sK'$ is strictly smaller than $\dim(K)+\dim(K') \le 1$ (``geometric resonance''), then there exists $r<1$ such that all contraction ratios of the similitudes defining $K$ and $K'$ are powers of $r$ (``algebraic resonance''). Our method also yields a new result on the projections of planar self-similar sets generated by an iterated function system that includes a scaled irrational rotation., Comment: To appear in Ergodic Theory and Dynamical Systems. 24 pages, 2 figures