De Rham curve
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In mathematics, a de Rham curve is a certain type of fractal curve. The Cantor function, Minkowski's question mark function, the Lévy C curve, the blancmange curve and the Koch curve are all special cases of the general de Rham curve. The curve is named in honor of Georges de Rham.
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[edit] Construction
Consider a pair of contracting maps
and
By the Banach fixed point theorem, these have fixed points p0 and p1 respectively. Let x be a real number in the interval , having binary expansion
Here, each bk is understood to be an integer, 0 or 1. Consider the map
given by
where denotes function composition. It can be shown that each cx will map the common basin of attraction of d0 and d1 to a single point . The collection of points px, parameterized by a single real parameter x, is known as the de Rham curve.
[edit] Properties
When the fixed points are paired such that
- d0(p1) = d1(p0)
then it may be shown that the resulting curve px is a continuous function of x. When the curve is continuous, it is not in general differentiable. The self-symmetries of all of the de Rham curves are given by the monoid that describes the symmetries of the infinite binary tree or Cantor set. This so-called period-doubling monoid is a subset of the modular group.
[edit] Example: Césaro curve
Let and let be a constant such that | a | < 1 and | 1 − a | < 1. Consider then the maps
- d0(z) = az
and
- d1(z) = a + (1 − a)z
For the value of a = (1 + i) / 2, the resulting curve is the Lévy C curve. For general values of a, the curve is often known as the Césaro curve or the Césaro-Faber curve.
[edit] Example: Koch curve
The Koch curve and the Peano curve may be obtained by
and
where denotes the complex conjugate of z. The classic Koch curve is obtained by setting
while the Peano curve corresponds to a = (1 + i) / 2.
[edit] Example: General affine maps
The Cesaro-Faber and Peano-Koch curves are both special cases of the general case of a pair of affine linear transformations on the complex plane. By fixing one endpoint of the curve at 0 and the other at one, the general case is obtained by iterating on the two transforms
and
Being affine transforms, these transforms act on a point (u,v) of the 2-D plane by acting on the vector
The midpoint of the curve can be seen to be located at (u,v) = (α,β); the other four parameters may be varied to create a large variety of curves.
[edit] Example: Minkowski's question mark function
Minkowski's question mark function is generated by the pair of maps
and
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- Georges de Rham, On Some Curves Defined by Functional Equations (1957), reprinted in Classics on Fractals, ed. Gerald A. Edgar (Addison-Wesley, 1993), pp. 285–298.
- Linas Vepstas, Symmetries of Period-Doubling Maps, (2004). (A general exploration of the modular group symmetry in fractal curves.)