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We show that there is a rank 1 transformation that is mildly mixing but does not have minimal self-joinings, answering a question of Thouvenot., Comment: 46 pages, 6 figures

A lamination $\lambda$ is $\epsilon$-thick (with respect to a basepoint $X$), if the Teichm\"uller ray from $X$ in the direction of $\lambda$ stays in the $\epsilon$-thick part. We show that, for surfaces of high enough genus, any two $\epsilon$-thick laminations can be joined by a path of $\delta$-thick laminations. As a consequence, we show that the Morse boundary of the mapping class group is path-connected. Furthermore, we construct a subshift of finite type on the mapping class group, whose limit set consists only of thick laminations and is path-connected., Comment: 30 pages

We completely characterize rational polygons whose billiard flow is weakly mixing in almost every direction as those which are not almost integrable, in the terminology of Gutkin, modulo some low complexity exceptions. This proves a longstanding conjecture of Gutkin. This result is derived from a complete characterization of translation surfaces that are weakly mixing in almost every direction: they are those that do not admit an affine factor map to the circle.

Let M be an invariant subvariety in the moduli space of translation surfaces. We contribute to the study of the dynamical properties of the horocycle flow on M. In the context of dynamics on the moduli space of translation surfaces, we introduce the notion of a 'weak classification of horocycle invariant measures' and we study its consequences. Among them, we prove genericity of orbits and related uniform equidistribution results, asymptotic equidistribution of sequences of pushed measures, and counting of saddle connection holonomies. As an example, we show that invariant varieties of rank one, Rel-dimension one and related spaces obtained by adding marked points satisfy the 'weak classification of horocycle invariant measures'. Our results extend prior results obtained by Eskin-Masur-Schmoll, Eskin-Marklof-Morris, and Bainbridge-Smillie-Weiss.

Let $\mathcal{H}$ be a stratum of translation surfaces with at least two singularities, let $m_{\mathcal{H}}$ denote the Masur-Veech measure on $\mathcal{H}$, and let $Z_0$ be a flow on $(\mathcal{H}, m_{\mathcal{H}})$ obtained by integrating a Rel vector field. We prove that $Z_0$ is mixing of all orders, and in particular is ergodic. We also characterize the ergodicity of flows defined by Rel vector field, for more general spaces $(\mathcal{L}, m_{\mathcal{L}})$, where $\mathcal{L} \subset \mathcal{H}$ is an orbit-closure for the action of $G = \mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{R})$ (i.e., an affine invariant subvariety) and $m_{\mathcal{L}}$ is the natural measure. Our results are conditional on a forthcoming measure classification result of Brown, Eskin, Filip and Rodriguez-Hertz.We also prove that the entropy of the action of $Z_0$ on $(\mathcal{L}, m_{\mathcal{L})$ has zero entropy., Comment: This version contains a new result about entropy. Also minor changes were made to improve the presentation, and the title was changed

Let $\Lambda_1$, $\Lambda_2$ be two discrete orbits under the linear action of a lattice $\Gamma<\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{R})$ on the Euclidean plane. We prove a Siegel$-$Veech-type integral formula for the averages $$ \sum_{\mathbf{x}\in\Lambda_1} \sum_{\mathbf{y}\in\Lambda_2} f(\mathbf{x}, \mathbf{y}) $$ from which we derive new results for the set $S_M$ of holonomy vectors of saddle connections of a Veech surface $M$. This includes an effective count for generic Borel sets with respect to linear transformations, and upper bounds on the number of pairs in $S_M$ with bounded determinant and on the number of pairs in $S_M$ with bounded distance. This last estimate is used in the appendix to prove that for almost every $(\theta,\psi)\in S^1\times S^1$ the translations flows $F_\theta^t$ and $F_\psi^t$ on any Veech surface $M$ are disjoint., Comment: By Claire Burrin and Samantha Fairchild with an appendix by Jon Chaika. Final version accepted to Journal of the European Mathematical Society

A translation surface is given by polygons in the plane, with sides identified by translations to create a closed Riemann surface with a flat structure away from finitely many singular points. Understanding geodesic flow on a surface involves understanding saddle connections. Saddle connections are the geodesics starting and ending at these singular points and are associated to a discrete subset of the plane. To measure the behavior of saddle connections of length at most $R$, we obtain precise decay rates as $R\to \infty$ for the difference in angle between two almost horizontal saddle connections.

We show that in large enough rank, the Gromov boundary of the free factor complex is path connected and locally path connected., Comment: 48 pages, 7 figures; fixed an issue in the proof of Theorem 1.1

We study the horocycle flow on the stratum of translation surfaces $\mathcal{H}(2)$. We show that there is a sequence of horocycle ergodic measures, each supported on a periodic horocycle orbit, which weakly converges to an invariant, but non-ergodic, measure by $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{R})$. As a consequence, we show that there are points in $\mathcal{H}(2)$ whose horocycle flow orbits do not equidistribute towards any invariant measure., Comment: Corrections based on referee reports, clarifications of statements of main results and of the arguments in Section 7, expanded and clarified some of the discussions in the introduction. Main results are not affected

Building on works of Berth\'e--Steiner--Thuswaldner and Fogg--Nous we show that on the two-dimensional torus, Lebesgue almost every translation admits a natural coding such that the associated subshift satisfies the Boshernitzan criterion. As a consequence we show that for these torus translations, every quasi-periodic potential can be approximated uniformly by one for which the associated Schr\"odinger operator has Cantor spectrum of zero Lebesgue measure. We also describe a framework that can allow this to be extended to higher-dimensional tori., Comment: 17 pages

We introduce a "tremor" deformation on strata of translation surfaces. Using it, we give new examples of behaviors of horocycle flow orbits in strata of translation surfaces. In the genus two stratum with two singular points, we find orbits which are generic for a measure whose support is strictly contained in the orbit and find orbits which are not generic for any measure. We also describe a horocycle orbit-closure whose Hausdorff dimension is not an integer.

We prove that there exists a residual set of (non-rational) polygons such the billiard flow is weakly mixing with respect to the Liouville measure (on the unit tangent bundle to the billiard). This follows, via a Baire category argument, from showing that for any translation surface the product of the flows in almost every pair of directions is ergodic with respect to Lebesgue measure. This in turn is proven by showing that for every translation surface the flows in almost every pair of directions do not share non-trivial common eigenvalues., Comment: 40 pages

We consider smooth flows preserving a smooth invariant measure, or, equivalently, locally Hamiltonian flows on compact orientable surfaces and show that, when the genus of the surface is two, almost every such locally Hamiltonian flow with two non degenerate isomorphic saddle has singular spectrum. More in general, singularity of the spectrum holds for special flows over a full measure set of interval exchange transformations with a hyperelliptic permutation (of any number of exchanged intervals), under a roof with symmetric logarithmic singularities. The result is proved using a criterion for singularity based on tightness of Birkhoff sums with exponential tails decay. A key ingredient in the proof, which is of independent interest, is a result on translation surfaces well approximated by single cylinders. We show that for almost every translation surface in any connected component of any stratum there exists a full measure set of directions which can be well approximated by a single cylinder of area arbitrarily close to one. The result, in the special case of the stratum $\mathcal{H}(1,1)$, yields rigidity sets needed for the singularity result., Comment: 32 pages, 7 figures

This paper is a sequel to Chaika and Krishnan [arXiv:1612.00434]. We again consider translation invariant measures on families of nearest-neighbor semi-infinite walks on the integer lattice Z^d. We assume that once walks meet, they coalesce. We consider various entropic properties of these systems. We show that in systems with completely positive entropy, bi-infinite trajectories must carry entropy. In the case of directed walks in dimension 2 we show that positive entropy guarantees that all trajectories cannot be bi-infinite. To show that our theorems are proper, we construct a stationary discrete-time symmetric exclusion process whose particle trajectories form bi-infinite trajectories carrying entropy., Comment: Fixed some typos, included a reference to Hoffman's paper on discrete time totally asymmetric simple exclusion

We show that for a closed surface of genus at least 5, or a surface of genus at least 2 with at least one marked point, the set of uniquely ergodic foliations and the set of cobounded foliations is path-connected and locally path-connected., Comment: 42 pages, 2 figures

We construct a rigid, rank 1, prime transformation that is not quasi-simple and whose self-joinings form a Paulsen simplex. This seems to be the first example of a prime system whose self-joinings form a Paulsen simplex.

This is a straightforward generalization Section 2 of arXiv:1805.11167. It shows that for a residual set of transformations in the space of measure preserving transformations, with the weak topology, any self-joining defines a Markov operator that is a strong operator topology limit of convex combinations of powers of the unitary operator given by the transformation., Comment: This is a lightly edited and straightforward generalization of Section 2 of arXiv:1805.11167

We show that the typical measure preserving transformation is not isomorphic to any interval exchange transformation.

For almost every flat surface the sequence of saddle connection lengths listed in increasing order is uniformly distributed mod one., Comment: With an appendix by Daniel El-Baz and Bingrong Huang

We show that typical interval exchange transformations on three intervals are not 2-simple answering a question of Veech. Moreover, the set of self-joinings of almost every 3-IET is a Paulsen simplex., Comment: 25 pages, 3 figures

Let $R_\alpha$ be an irrational rotation of the circle, and code the orbit of any point $x$ by whether $R_\alpha^i(x)$ belongs to $[0,\alpha)$ or $[\alpha,1)$ -- this produces a Sturmian sequence. A point is undetermined at step $j$ if its coding up to time $j$ does not determine its coding at time $j+1$. We prove a pair of results on the asymptotic frequency of a point being undetermined, for full measure sets of $\alpha$ and $x$., Comment: 16 pages. Updated with minor revisions to match published version. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1201.0941

We show that the set of not uniquely ergodic d-IETs has Hausdorff dimension d-3/2 (in the (d-1)-dimension space of d-IETs) for d>4. For d=4 this was shown by Athreya-Chaika and for d=2,3 the set is known to have dimension d-2.

We prove that the skew product over a linearly recurrent interval exchange transformation defined by almost any real-valued, mean-zero linear combination of characteristic functions of intervals is ergodic with respect to Lebesgue measure., Comment: V2: Rewrite of Sections 3, 4.4, 4.5 and A

We show the middle Nth cantor set contains arithmetic progressions of length at least proportional to N/log_2(N).

We consider translation invariant measures on families of nearest-neighbor semi-infinite walks on the integer lattice. We assume that once walks meet, they coalesce. In $2d$, we classify the collective behavior of these walks under mild assumptions: they either coalesce almost surely or form bi-infinite trajectories. Bi-infinite trajectories form measure-preserving dynamical systems, have a common asymptotic direction in $2d$, and possess other nice properties. We use our theory to classify the behavior of compatible families of semi-infinite geodesics in stationary first- and last-passage percolation. We also partially answer a question raised by C. Hoffman about the limiting empirical measure of weights seen by geodesics. We construct several examples: our main example is a standard first-passage percolation model where geodesics coalesce almost surely, but have no asymptotic direction or average weight., Comment: Accepted to Probability Theory and Related Fields. Final version. Fixed several typos, Probab. Theory Relat. Fields (2018)

We show that Sarnak's conjecture on Mobius disjointness holds for interval exchange transformations on three intervals (3-IETs) that satisfy a mild diophantine condition., Comment: 32 pages, 3 figures

We show that Masur's logarithmic law of geodesics in the moduli space of translation surfaces does not imply unique ergodicity of the translation flow, but that a similar law involving the flat systole of a Teichm\"{u}ller geodesic does imply unique ergodicity. It shows that the flat geometry has a better control on ergodic properties of translation flow than hyperbolic geometry., Comment: 24 pages

We prove that on the typical translation surface the flow in almost every pair of directions are not isomorphic to each other and are in fact disjoint. It was not known if there were any translation surfaces other than torus covers with this property. We provide an application to the convergence of `circle averages' for the flow (away from a sequence of radii of density 0) for such surfaces. Even the density of a sequence of 'circles' was only known in a few special examples., Comment: 14 pages

The orbit closure of any translation surface under the horocycle flow in almost any direction equals its $SL_2(\mathbb{R})$ orbit closure. This result gives rise to new characterizations of lattice surfaces in terms of the hororcycle flow., Comment: 20 pages

We construct a smooth, area preserving, mixing flow with finitely many non-degenerate fixed points and no saddle connections on a closed surface of genus 5. This resolves a problem that has been open for four decades., Comment: 39 pages, 3 figures

We show that there exists an interval exchange and a point so that the orbit of the point equidistributes for a measure that is not ergodic.

We consider the limit set in Thurston's compactification PMF of Teichmueller space of some Teichmueller geodesics defined by quadratic differentials with minimal but not uniquely ergodic vertical foliations. We show that a) there are quadratic differentials so that the limit set of the geodesic is a unique point, b) there are quadratic differentials so that the limit set is a line segment, c) there are quadratic differentials so that the vertical foliation is ergodic and there is a line segment as limit set, and d) there are quadratic differentials so that the vertical foliation is ergodic and there is a unique point as its limit set. These give examples of divergent Teichmueller geodesics whose limit sets overlap and Teichmueller geodesics that stay a bounded distance apart but whose limit sets are not equal. A byproduct of our methods is a construction of a Teichmueller geodesic and a simple closed curve $\gamma$ so that the hyperbolic length of the geodesic in the homotopy class of gamma varies between increasing and decreasing on an unbounded sequence of time intervals along the geodesic., Comment: 39 pages, 4 figures

Let $\pi$ be a non-degenerate permutation on at least $4$ symbols. We show that the set of uniquely ergodic interval exchange transformations with permutation $\pi$ is path-connected., Comment: Major rewrite, argument reorganised and streamlined. (40 pages, 7 figures)

We show that for almost every (with respect to Masur-Veech measure) $\omega \in \mathcal{H}(2)$, the set of angles $\theta \in [0, 2\pi)$ so that $e^{i\theta}\omega$ has non-uniquely ergodic vertical foliation has Hausdorff dimension (and codimension) $1/2$., Comment: Comprehensive rewrite. Hausdorff dimension lower bound axiomatized

We give an explicit formula for the limiting gap distribution of slopes of saddle connections on the golden L, or any translation surface in its SL(2, R)-orbit, in particular the double pentagon. This is the first explicit computation of the distribution of gaps for a flat surface that is not a torus cover.

We prove that the Birkhoff pointwise ergodic theorem and the Oseledets multiplicative ergodic theorem hold for every flat surface in almost every direction. The proofs rely on the strong law of large numbers, and on recent rigidity results for the action of the upper triangular subgroup of SL(2,R) on the moduli space of flat surfaces. Most of the results also use a theorem about continuity of splittings of the Kontsevich-Zorich cocycle recently proved by S. Filip., Comment: 23 pages

We show that a residual set of non-degenerate IETs on more than 3 letters is topologically mixing. This shows that there exists a uniquely ergodic topologically mixing IET. This is then applied to show that some billiard flows in a fixed direction in an L-shaped polygon are topologically mixing., Comment: Update to include revisions based on referee's comments. The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00220-014-2191-x

Let H stand for the set of homeomorphisms on [0,1]. We prove the following dichotomy for Borel subsets A of [0,1]: either there exists a homeomorphism f in H such that the image f(A) contains no 3-term arithmetic progressions; or, for every f in H, the image f(A) contains arithmetic progressions of arbitrary finite length. In fact, we show that the first alternative holds if and only if the set A is meager (a countable union of nowhere dense sets).

This paper presents quantitative shrinking target results for rotations and interval exchange transformations. To do this a quantitative version of a unique ergodicity criterion of Boshernitzan is established., Comment: 45 pages. Significant revisions and clarifications since the previous posting

We consider how quickly a typical point returns to neighborhoods of itself under the flow in a typical direction on a translation surface., Comment: 4 pages

A natural generalization of interval exchange maps are linear involutions, first introduced by Danthony and Nogueira. Recurrent train tracks with a single switch which we call non-classical interval exchanges, form a subclass of linear involutions without flips. They are analogs of classical interval exchanges, and are first return maps for non-orientable measured foliations associated to quadratic differentials on Riemann surfaces. We show that every transformation is disjoint from almost every irreducible non-classical interval exchange. In the appendix, we prove that for almost every pair of quadratic differentials with respect to the Masur-Veech measure, the vertical flows are disjoint. In the appendix, we prove that for almost every pair of quadratic differentials with respect to the Masur-Veech measure, the vertical flows are disjoint., Comment: Added the appendix

After relating the notion of $\omega$-recurrence in skew products to the range of values taken by partial ergodic sums and Lyapunov exponents, ergodic $\mathbb{Z}$-valued cocycles over an irrational rotation are presented in detail. First, the generic situation is studied and shown to be $1/n$-recurrent. It is then shown that for any $\omega(n) 1/2$, there are uncountably many infinite staircases (a certain specific cocycle over a rotation) which are \textit{not} $\omega$-recurrent, and therefore have positive Lyapunov exponent. A further section makes brief remarks regarding cocycles over interval exchange transformations of periodic type.

We construct some skew products over rotations with strange properties. We construct a non-uniquely ergodic Z_2 skew product over a bounded quotient rotation. We describe some of its properties and related Z skew products.