arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Michael Baake.
A brief summary of recent developments in mathematical diffraction theory is given. Particular emphasis is placed on systems with aperiodic order and continuous spectral components. We restrict ourselves to some key results and refer to the literature for further details.
The theory of substitution sequences and their higher-dimensional analogues is intimately connected with symbolic dynamics. By systematically studying the factors (in the sense of dynamical systems theory) of a substitution dynamical system, one can reach a better understanding of spectral and topological properties. We illustrate this point of view by means of some characteristic examples, including a rather universal substitution in one dimension as well as the squiral and the table tilings of the plane.
The Thue-Morse system is a paradigm of singular continuous diffraction in one dimension. Here, we consider a planar system, constructed by a bijective block substitution rule, which is locally equivalent to the squiral inflation rule. For balanced weights, its diffraction is purely singular continuous. The diffraction measure is a two-dimensional Riesz product that can be calculated explicitly.
Aperiodic tilings with a small number of prototiles are of particular interest, both theoretically and for applications in crystallography. In this direction, many people have tried to construct aperiodic tilings that are built from a single prototile with nearest neighbour matching rules, which is then called a monotile. One strand of the search for a planar monotile has focussed on hexagonal analogues of Wang tiles. This led to two inflation tilings with interesting structural details. Both possess aperiodic local rules that define hulls with a model set structure. We review them in comparison, and clarify their relation with the classic half-hex tiling. In particular, we formulate various known results in a more comparative way, and augment them with some new results on the geometry and the topology of the underlying tiling spaces.
In a recent paper, Lenz and Moody (arXiv:1111.3617) presented a method for constructing families of real solutions to the inverse problem for a given pure point diffraction measure. Applying their technique and discussing some possible extensions, we present, in a non-technical manner, some examples of homometric structures.
The random local mixture of a family of primitive substitution rules with noble mean inflation multiplier is investigated. This extends the random Fibonacci example that was introduced by Godrèche and Luck in 1989. We discuss the structure of the corresponding dynamical systems, and determine their entropy, an ergodic invariant measure and diffraction spectrum.
Non-periodic systems have become more important in recent years, both theoretically and practically. Their description via Delone sets requires the extension of many standard concepts of crystallography. Here, we summarise some useful notions of symmetry and aperiodicity, with special focus on the concept of the hull of a Delone set. Our aim is to contribute to a more systematic and consistent use of the different notions.
Kinematic diffraction is well suited for a mathematical approach via measures, which has substantially been developed since the discovery of quasicrystals. The need for further insight emerged from the question of which distributions of matter, beyond perfect crystals, lead to pure point diffraction, hence to sharp Bragg peaks only. More recently, it has become apparent that one also has to study continuous diffraction in more detail, with a careful analysis of the different types of diffuse scattering involved. In this review, we summarise some key results, with particular emphasis on non-periodic structures. We choose an exposition on the basis of characteristic examples, while we refer to the existing literature for proofs and further details.
The squiral inflation rule is equivalent to a bijective block substitution rule and leads to an interesting lattice dynamical system under the action of $\mathbb{Z}^{2}$. In particular, its balanced version has purely singular continuous diffraction. The dynamical spectrum is of mixed type, with pure point and singular continuous components. We present a constructive proof that admits a generalisation to bijective block substitutions of trivial height on $\mathbb{Z}^{d}$.
We study various aspects of the dynamics induced by integer matrices on the invariant rational lattices of the torus in dimension 2 and greater. Firstly, we investigate the orbit structure when the toral endomorphism is not invertible on the lattice, characterising the pretails of eventually periodic orbits. Next we study the nature of the symmetries and reversing symmetries of toral automorphisms on a given lattice, which has particular relevance to (quantum) cat maps.
Diffraction methods are used to detect atomic order in solids. While uniquely ergodic systems with pure point diffraction have zero entropy, the relation between diffraction and entropy is not as straightforward in general. In particular, there exist families of homometric systems, which are systems sharing the same diffraction, with varying entropy. We summarise the present state of understanding by several characteristic examples.
The classic middle-thirds Cantor set leads to a singular continuous measure via a distribution function that is know as the Devil's staircase. The support of the Cantor measure is a set of zero Lebesgue measure. Here, we discuss a class of singular continuous measures that emerge in mathematical diffraction theory and lead to somewhat similar distribution functions, yet with significant differences. Various properties of these measures are derived. In particular, these measures have supports of full Lebesgue measure and possess strictly increasing distribution functions. In this sense, they mark the opposite end of what is possible for singular continuous measures. For each member of the family, the underlying dynamical system possesses a topological factor with maximal pure point spectrum, and a close relation to a solenoid, which is the Kronecker factor of the system. The inflation action on the continuous hull is sufficiently explicit to permit the calculation of the corresponding dynamical zeta functions. This is achieved as a corollary of analysing the Anderson-Putnam complex for the determination of the cohomological invariants of the corresponding tiling spaces.
Mathematical diffraction theory is concerned with the analysis of the diffraction image of a given structure and the corresponding inverse problem of structure determination. In recent years, the understanding of systems with continuous and mixed spectra has improved considerably. Simultaneously, their relevance has grown in practice as well. In this context, the phenomenon of homometry shows various unexpected new facets. This is particularly so for systems with stochastic components. After the introduction to the mathematical tools, we briefly discuss pure point spectra, based on the Poisson summation formula for lattice Dirac combs. This provides an elegant approach to the diffraction formulas of infinite crystals and quasicrystals. We continue by considering classic deterministic examples with singular or absolutely continuous diffraction spectra. In particular, we recall an isospectral family of structures with continuously varying entropy. We close with a summary of more recent results on the diffraction of dynamical systems of algebraic or stochastic origin.
The translation action of $\RR^{d}$ on a translation bounded measure $ω$ leads to an interesting class of dynamical systems, with a rather rich spectral theory. In general, the diffraction spectrum of $ω$, which is the carrier of the diffraction measure, live on a subset of the dynamical spectrum. It is known that, under some mild assumptions, a pure point diffraction spectrum implies a pure point dynamical spectrum (the opposite implication always being true). For other systems, the diffraction spectrum can be a proper subset of the dynamical spectrum, as was pointed out for the Thue-Morse sequence (with singular continuous diffraction) in \cite{EM}. Here, we construct a random system of close-packed dimers on the line that have some underlying long-range periodic order as well, and display the same type of phenomenon for a system with absolutely continuous spectrum. An interpretation in terms of `atomic' versus `molecular' spectrum suggests a way to come to a more general correspondence between these two types of spectra.
The diffraction of various random subsets of the integer lattice $\mathbb{Z}^{d}$, such as the coin tossing and related systems, are well understood. Here, we go one important step beyond and consider random point sets in $\mathbb{R}^{d}$. We present several systems with an effective stochastic interaction that still allow for explicit calculations of the autocorrelation and the diffraction measure. We concentrate on one-dimensional examples for illustrative purposes, and briefly indicate possible generalisations to higher dimensions. In particular, we discuss the stationary Poisson process in $\mathbb{R}^{d}$ and the renewal process on the line. The latter permits a unified approach to a rather large class of one-dimensional structures, including random tilings. Moreover, we present some stationary point processes that are derived from the classical random matrix ensembles as introduced in the pioneering work of Dyson and Ginibre. Their re-consideration from the diffraction point of view improves the intuition on systems with randomness and mixed spectra.
Limit periodic point sets are aperiodic structures with pure point diffraction supported on a countably, but not finitely generated Fourier module that is based on a lattice and certain integer multiples of it. Examples are cut and project sets with p-adic internal spaces. We illustrate this by explicit results for the diffraction measures of two examples with 2-adic internal spaces. The first and well-known example is the period doubling sequence in one dimension, which is based on the period doubling substitution rule. The second example is a weighted planar point set that is derived from the classic chair tiling in the plane. It can be described as a fixed point of a block substitution rule.
We examine the diffraction properties of lattice dynamical systems of algebraic origin. It is well-known that diverse dynamical properties occur within this class. These include different orders of mixing (or higher-order correlations), the presence or absence of measure rigidity (restrictions on the set of possible shift-invariant ergodic measures to being those of algebraic origin), and different entropy ranks (which may be viewed as the maximal spatial dimension in which the system resembles an i.i.d.\ process). Despite these differences, it is shown that the resulting diffraction spectra are essentially indistinguishable, thus raising further difficulties for the inverse problem of structure determination from diffraction spectra. Some of them may be resolved on the level of higher-order correlation functions, which we also briefly compare.
Stochastic point processes relevant to the theory of long-range aperiodic order are considered that display diffraction spectra of mixed type, with special emphasis on explicitly computable cases together with a unified approach of reasonable generality. The latter is based on the classical theory of point processes and the Palm distribution. Several pairs of autocorrelation and diffraction measures are discussed which show a duality structure analogous to that of the Poisson summation formula for lattice Dirac combs.