Dynamics on the Riemann Sphere presents a collection of original research articles by leading experts in the area of holomorphic dynamics. These papers arose from the symposium Dynamics in the Complex Plane, held on the occasion of the 60th birthday of Bodil Branner. Topics covered range from Lattes maps to cubic polynomials over rational maps with Sierpinsky Carpets and Gaskets as Julia sets, as well as rational and entire transcendental maps with Herman rings.
Addressing researchers and graduate students in the active meeting ground of analysis, geometry, and dynamics, this book presents a study of renormalization of quadratic polynomials and a rapid introduction to techniques in complex dynamics. Its central concern is the structure of an infinitely renormalizable quadratic polynomial f(z) = z2 + c. As discovered by Feigenbaum, such a mapping exhibits a repetition of form at infinitely many scales. Drawing on universal estimates in hyperbolic geometry, this work gives an analysis of the limiting forms that can occur and develops a rigidity criterion for the polynomial f. This criterion supports general conjectures about the behavior of rational maps and the structure of the Mandelbrot set. The course of the main argument entails many facets of modern complex dynamics. Included are foundational results in geometric function theory, quasiconformal mappings, and hyperbolic geometry. Most of the tools are discussed in the setting of general polynomials and rational maps.
This volume studies the dynamics of iterated holomorphic mappings from a Riemann surface to itself, concentrating on the classical case of rational maps of the Riemann sphere. This subject is large and rapidly growing. These lectures are intended to introduce some key ideas in the field, and to form a basis for further study. The reader is assumed to be familiar with the rudiments of complex variable theory and of two-dimensional differential geometry, as well as some basic topics from topology. This third edition contains a number of minor additions and improvements: A historical survey has been added, the definition of Lattés map has been made more inclusive, and the écalle-Voronin theory of parabolic points is described. The résidu itératif is studied, and the material on two complex variables has been expanded. Recent results on effective computability have been added, and the references have been expanded and updated. Written in his usual brilliant style, the author makes difficult mathematics look easy. This book is a very accessible source for much of what has been accomplished in the field.
In the last fifteen years, the Mandelbrot set has emerged as one of the most recognizable objects in mathematics. While there is no question of its beauty, relatively few people appreciate the fact that the mathematics behind such images is equally beautiful. This book presents lectures delivered during the AMS Short Course entitled ``Complex Dynamical Systems: The Mathematics Behind the Mandelbrot and Julia Sets'', held at the Joint Mathematics Meetings in Cincinnati in January 1994. The lectures cover a wide range of topics, including the classical work of Julia and Fatou on local dynamics of analytic maps as well as recent work on the dynamics of quadratic and cubic polynomials, the geometry of Julia sets, and the structure of various parameter spaces. Among the other topics are recent results on Yoccoz puzzles and tableaux, limiting dynamics near parabolic points, the spider algorithm, extensions of the theory to rational maps, Newton's method, and entire transcendental functions. Much of the book is accessible to anyone with a background in the basics of dynamical systems and complex analysis.
In this book, Miranda takes the approach that algebraic curves are best encountered for the first time over the complex numbers, where the reader's classical intuition about surfaces, integration, and other concepts can be brought into play. Therefore, many examples of algebraic curves are presented in the first chapters. In this way, the book begins as a primer on Riemann surfaces, with complex charts and meromorphic functions taking centre stage. But the main examples come fromprojective curves, and slowly but surely the text moves toward the algebraic category. Proofs of the Riemann-Roch and Serre Dualtiy Theorems are presented in an algebraic manner, via an adaptation of the adelic proof, expressed completely in terms of solving a Mittag-Leffler problem. Sheaves andcohomology are introduced as a unifying device in the later chapters, so that their utility and naturalness are immediately obvious. Requiring a background of one term of complex variable theory and a year of abstract algebra, this is an excellent graduate textbook for a second-term course in complex variables or a year-long course in algebraic geometry.
Chaotic behavior of (even the simplest) iterations of polynomial maps of the complex plane was known for almost one hundred years due to the pioneering work of Farou, Julia, and their contemporaries. However, it was only twenty-five years ago that the first computer generated images illustrating properties of iterations of quadratic maps appeared. These images of the so-called Mandelbrot and Julia sets immediately resulted in a strong resurgence of interest in complex dynamics. The present volume, based on the talks at the conference commemorating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the appearance of Mandelbrot sets, provides a panorama of current research in this truly fascinating area of mathematics.
This volume contains a number of research-expository articles that appeared in the Bulletin of the AMS between 1979 and 1984 and that address the general area of nonlinear functional analysis and global analysis and their applications. The central theme concerns qualitative methods in the study of nonlinear problems arising in applied mathematics, mathematical physics, and geometry. Since these articles first appeared, the methods and ideas they describe have been applied in an ever-widening array of applications. Readers will find this collection useful, as it brings together a range of influential papers by some of the leading researchers in the field.
Now approaching its tenth year, this hugely successful book presents an unusual attempt to publicise the field of Complex Dynamics. The text was originally conceived as a supplemented catalogue to the exhibition "Frontiers of Chaos", seen in Europe and the United States, and describes the context and meaning of these fascinating images. A total of 184 illustrations - including 88 full-colour pictures of Julia sets - are suggestive of a coffee-table book. However, the invited contributions which round off the book lend the text the required formality. Benoit Mandelbrot gives a very personal account, in his idiosyncratic self-centred style, of his discovery of the fractals named after him and Adrien Douady explains the solved and unsolved problems relating to this amusingly complex set.
This volume contains the proceedings of the special session on Modern Methods in Continuum Theory presented at the 100th Annual Joint Mathematics Meetings held in Cincinnati, Ohio. It also features the Houston Problem Book which includes a recently updated set of 200 problems accumulated over several years at the University of Houston.;These proceedings and problems are aimed at pure and applied mathematicians, topologists, geometers, physicists and graduate-level students in these disciplines.
