This paper concerns the study of the global structure of measure-preserving actions of countable groups on standard probability spaces. Weak containment is a hierarchical notion of complexity of such actions, motivated by an analogous concept in the theory of unitary representations. This concept gives rise to an associated notion of equivalence of actions, called weak equivalence, which is much coarser than the notion of isomorphism (conjugacy). It is well understood now that, in general, isomorphism is a very complex notion, a fact which manifests itself, for example, in the lack of any reasonable structure in the space of actions modulo isomorphism. On the other hand, the space of weak equivalence classes is quite well behaved. Another interesting fact that relates to the study of weak containment is that many important parameters associated with actions, such as the type, cost, and combinatorial parameters, turn out to be invariants of weak equivalence and in fact exhibit desirable monotonicity properties with respect to the pre-order of weak containment, a fact that can be useful in certain applications. There has been quite a lot of activity in this area in the last few years, and our goal in this paper is to provide a survey of this work.

Given a lamination in a compact space and a laminated vector field $X$ which is hyperbolic when restricted to the leaves of the lamination, we distinguish a class of $X$-invariant probabilities that describe the behavior of almost every $X$-orbit in every leaf, which we call Gibbs $u$-states. We apply this to the case of foliations in compact manifolds having leaves with negative curvature, using the foliated hyperbolic vector field on the unit tangent bundle to the foliation generating the leaf geodesics. When the Lyapunov exponents of such ergodic Gibbs $u$-states are negative, it is an SRB measure (having a positive Lebesgue basin of attraction). When the foliation is by hyperbolic leaves, this class of probabilities coincide with the classical harmonic measures introduced by Garnett. Furthermore, if the foliation is transversally conformal and does not admit a transverse invariant measure we show that there are finitely many ergodic Gibbs $u$-states, each supported in one minimal set of the foliation, each having negative Lyapunov exponents, and the union of their basins of attraction has full Lebesgue measure. The leaf geodesics emanating from a point have a proportion whose asymptotic statistics are described by each of these ergodic Gibbs $u$-states, giving rise to continuous visibility functions of the attractors. Reversing time, by considering $-X$, we obtain the existence of the same number of repellers of the foliated geodesic flow having the same harmonic measures as projections to $M$. In the case of only one attractor, we obtain a north to south pole dynamics.

A classic result due to Furstenberg is the strict ergodicity of the horocycle flow for a compact hyperbolic surface. Strict ergodicity is unique ergodicity with respect to a measure of full support, and therefore it implies minimality. The horocycle flow has been previously studied on minimal foliations by hyperbolic surfaces on closed manifolds, where it is known not to be minimal in general. In this paper, we prove that for the special case of Riemannian foliations, strict ergodicity of the horocycle flow still holds. This, in particular, proves that this flow is minimal, which establishes a conjecture proposed by Matsumoto. The main tool is a theorem due to Coudène, which he presented as an alternative proof for the surface case. It applies to two continuous flows defining a measure-preserving action of the affine group of the line on a compact metric space, precisely matching the foliated setting. In addition, we briefly discuss the application of Coudène’s theorem to other kinds of foliations.

We prove the one-dimensional almost sure invariance principle with essentially optimal rates for slowly (polynomially) mixing deterministic dynamical systems, such as Pomeau–Manneville intermittent maps, with Hölder continuous observables. Our rates have form $o(n^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FE}}L(n))$, where $L(n)$ is a slowly varying function and $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FE}$ is determined by the speed of mixing. We strongly improve previous results where the best available rates did not exceed $O(n^{1/4})$. To break the $O(n^{1/4})$ barrier, we represent the dynamics as a Young-tower-like Markov chain and adapt the methods of Berkes–Liu–Wu and Cuny–Dedecker–Merlevède on the Komlós–Major–Tusnády approximation for dependent processes.

In this paper we study digit frequencies in the setting of expansions in non-integer bases, and self-affine sets with non-empty interior. Within expansions in non-integer bases we show that if $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FD}\in (1,1.787\ldots )$ then every $x\in (0,1/(\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FD}-1))$ has a simply normal $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FD}$-expansion. We also prove that if $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FD}\in (1,(1+\sqrt{5})/2)$ then every $x\in (0,1/(\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FD}-1))$ has a $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FD}$-expansion for which the digit frequency does not exist, and a $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FD}$-expansion with limiting frequency of zeros $p$, where $p$ is any real number sufficiently close to $1/2$. For a class of planar self-affine sets we show that if the horizontal contraction lies in a certain parameter space and the vertical contractions are sufficiently close to $1$, then every non-trivial vertical fibre contains an interval. Our approach lends itself to explicit calculation and gives rise to new examples of self-affine sets with non-empty interior. One particular strength of our approach is that it allows for different rates of contraction in the vertical direction.

We show that systems with some specification properties are topologically or almost Borel universal, in the sense that any aperiodic subshift with lower entropy may be topologically or almost Borel embedded. This improves, with elementary tools, previous results of Quas and Soo [Ergodic universality of some topological dynamical systems. Trans. Amer. Math. Soc.368 (2016), 4137–4170].

Del Junco–Lemańczyk [Generic spectral properties of measure-preserving maps and applications. Proc. Amer. Math. Soc., 115 (3) (1992)] showed that a generic measure-preserving transformation satisfies certain orthogonality conditions. More precisely, there is a dense $G_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FF}}$ subset of measure preserving transformations such that, for every $T\in G$ and $k(1),k(2),\ldots ,k(l)\in \mathbb{Z}^{+}$, $k^{\prime }(1),k^{\prime }(2),\ldots ,k^{\prime }(l^{\prime })\in \mathbb{Z}^{+}$, the convolutions

$$\begin{eqnarray}\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}_{T^{k(1)}}\ast \cdots \ast \unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}_{T^{k(l)}}\quad \text{and}\quad \unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}_{T^{k^{\prime }(1)}}\ast \cdots \ast \unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}_{T^{k^{\prime }(l^{\prime })}},\end{eqnarray}$$

$\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}_{T^{k}}$

$T^{k}$

$(k(1),k(2),\ldots ,k(l))$

$(k^{\prime }(1),k^{\prime }(2),\ldots ,k^{\prime }(l^{\prime }))$

$L^{0}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D707},\mathbb{T})$

$L^{0}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D707},\mathbb{T})$

$\{\unicode[STIX]{x1D706}_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D705}}\}$

$\unicode[STIX]{x1D705}$

$\unicode[STIX]{x1D706}_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D705}}$

We consider the notion of the graph product of actions of discrete groups $\{G_{v}\}$ on a $C^{\ast }$-algebra ${\mathcal{A}}$ and show that under suitable commutativity conditions the graph product action $\star _{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6E4}}\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{v}:\star _{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6E4}}G_{v}\curvearrowright {\mathcal{A}}$ has the Haagerup property if each action $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{v}:G_{v}\curvearrowright {\mathcal{A}}$ possesses the Haagerup property. This generalizes the known results on graph products of groups with the Haagerup property. To accomplish this, we introduce the graph product of multipliers associated to the actions and show that the graph product of positive-definite multipliers is positive definite. These results have impacts on left-transformation groupoids and give an alternative proof of a known result for coarse embeddability. We also record a cohomological characterization of the Haagerup property for group actions.

Let $f:M\rightarrow M$ be a dynamically coherent partially hyperbolic diffeomorphism whose center foliation has all its leaves compact. We prove that if the unstable bundle of $f$ is one-dimensional, then the volume of center leaves must be bounded in $M$.

A Riemannian manifold $M$ has higher hyperbolic rank if every geodesic has a perpendicular Jacobi field making sectional curvature $-1$ with the geodesic. If, in addition, the sectional curvatures of $M$ lie in the interval $[-1,-\frac{1}{4}]$ and $M$ is closed, we show that $M$ is a locally symmetric space of rank one. This partially extends work by Constantine using completely different methods. It is also a partial counterpart to Hamenstädt’s hyperbolic rank rigidity result for sectional curvatures $\leq -1$, and complements well-known results on Euclidean and spherical rank rigidity.

Wieler has shown that every irreducible Smale space with totally disconnected stable sets is a solenoid (i.e., obtained via a stationary inverse limit construction). Using her construction, we show that the associated stable $C^{\ast }$-algebra is the stationary inductive limit of a $C^{\ast }$-stable Fell algebra that has a compact spectrum and trivial Dixmier–Douady invariant. This result applies in particular to Williams solenoids along with other examples. Beyond the structural implications of this inductive limit, one can use this result to, in principle, compute the $K$-theory of the stable $C^{\ast }$-algebra. A specific one-dimensional Smale space (the $aab/ab$-solenoid) is considered as an illustrative running example throughout.

We study invariant random subgroups (IRSs) of semidirect products $G=A\rtimes \unicode[STIX]{x1D6E4}$. In particular, we characterize all IRSs of parabolic subgroups of $\text{SL}_{d}(\mathbb{R})$, and show that all ergodic IRSs of $\mathbb{R}^{d}\rtimes \text{SL}_{d}(\mathbb{R})$ are either of the form $\mathbb{R}^{d}\rtimes K$ for some IRS of $\text{SL}_{d}(\mathbb{R})$, or are induced from IRSs of $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC}\rtimes \text{SL}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC})$, where $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6EC}<\mathbb{R}^{d}$ is a lattice.

The purpose of this paper is to establish mixing rates for infinite measure preserving almost Anosov diffeomorphisms on the two-dimensional torus. The main task is to establish regular variation of the tails of the first return time to the complement of a neighbourhood of the neutral fixed point.

We study the complexity of the itineraries of injective piecewise contracting maps on the interval. We prove that for any such map the complexity function of any itinerary is eventually affine. We also prove that the growth rate of the complexity is bounded from above by the number, $N-1$, of discontinuities of the map. To show that this bound is optimal, we construct piecewise affine contracting maps whose itineraries all have the complexity $(N-1)n+1$. In these examples, the asymptotic dynamics take place in a minimal Cantor set containing all the discontinuities.

We prove that generic fiber-bunched and Hölder continuous linear cocycles over a non-uniformly hyperbolic system endowed with a $u$-Gibbs measure have simple Lyapunov spectrum. This gives an affirmative answer to a conjecture proposed by Viana in the context of fiber-bunched linear cocycles.

Let $Q$ be a closed manifold admitting a locally free action of a compact Lie group $G$. In this paper, we study the properties of geodesic flows on $Q$ given by suitable G-invariant Riemannian metrics. In particular, we will be interested in the existence of geodesics that are closed up to the action of some element in the group $G$, since they project to closed magnetic geodesics on the quotient orbifold $Q/G$.

Abelian cellular automata (CAs) are CAs which are group endomorphisms of the full group shift when endowing the alphabet with an abelian group structure. A CA randomizes an initial probability measure if its iterated images have weak*-convergence towards the uniform Bernoulli measure (the Haar measure in this setting). We are interested in structural phenomena, i.e., randomization for a wide class of initial measures (under some mixing hypotheses). First, we prove that an abelian CA randomizes in Cesàro mean if and only if it has no soliton, i.e., a non-zero finite configuration whose time evolution remains bounded in space. This characterization generalizes previously known sufficient conditions for abelian CAs with scalar or commuting coefficients. Second, we exhibit examples of strong randomizers, i.e., abelian CAs randomizing in simple convergence; this is the first proof of this behaviour to our knowledge. We show, however, that no CA with commuting coefficients can be strongly randomizing. Finally, we show that some abelian CAs achieve partial randomization without being randomizing: the distribution of short finite words tends to the uniform distribution up to some threshold, but this convergence fails for larger words. Again this phenomenon cannot happen for abelian CAs with commuting coefficients.

Let $f:X\rightarrow X$ be a continuous dynamical system on a compact metric space $X$ and let $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}:X\rightarrow \mathbb{R}^{m}$ be an $m$-dimensional continuous potential. The (generalized) rotation set $\text{Rot}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7})$ is defined as the set of all $\unicode[STIX]{x1D707}$-integrals of $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}$, where $\unicode[STIX]{x1D707}$ runs over all invariant probability measures. Analogous to the classical topological entropy, one can associate the localized entropy $\unicode[STIX]{x210B}(w)$ to each $w\in \text{Rot}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7})$. In this paper, we study the computability of rotation sets and localized entropy functions by deriving conditions that imply their computability. Then we apply our results to study the case where $f$ is a subshift of finite type. We prove that $\text{Rot}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7})$ is computable and that $\unicode[STIX]{x210B}(w)$ is computable in the interior of the rotation set. Finally, we construct an explicit example that shows that, in general, $\unicode[STIX]{x210B}$ is not continuous on the boundary of the rotation set when considered as a function of $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}$ and $w$. In particular, $\unicode[STIX]{x210B}$ is, in general, not computable at the boundary of $\text{Rot}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7})$.

A celebrated result by Bourgain and Wierdl states that ergodic averages along primes converge almost everywhere for $L^{p}$-functions, $p>1$, with a polynomial version by Wierdl and Nair. Using an anti-correlation result for the von Mangoldt function due to Green and Tao, we observe everywhere convergence of such averages for nilsystems and continuous functions.

By an assignment we mean a mapping from a Choquet simplex $K$ to probability measure-preserving systems obeying some natural restrictions. We prove that if $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}$ is an aperiodic assignment on a Choquet simplex $K$ such that the set of extreme points $\mathsf{ex}K$ is a countable union $\bigcup _{n}E_{n}$, where each set $E_{n}$ is compact, zero-dimensional and the restriction of $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}$ to the Bauer simplex $K_{n}$ spanned by $E_{n}$ can be ‘embedded’ in some topological dynamical system, then $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}$ can be ‘realized’ in a zero-dimensional system.