Fractal

About: Fractal is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 27333 publications have been published within this topic receiving 535436 citations. The topic is also known as: fractals & fractal set.

Techniques in fractal geometry

Abstract: Mathematical Background. Review of Fractal Geometry. Some Techniques for Studying Dimension. Cookie-cutters and Bounded Distortion. The Thermodynamic Formalism. The Ergodic Theorem and Fractals. The Renewal Theorem and Fractals. Martingales and Fractals. Tangent Measures. Dimensions of Measures. Some Multifractal Analysis. Fractals and Differential Equations. References. Index.

Super-Water-Repellent Fractal Surfaces

Abstract: Wettability of fractal surfaces has been studied both theoretically and experimentally. The contact angle of a liquid droplet placed on a fractal surface is expressed as a function of the fractal dimension, the range of fractal behavior, and the contacting ratio of the surface. The result shows that fractal surfaces can be super water repellent (superwettable) when the surfaces are composed of hydrophobic (hydrophilic) materials. We also demonstrate a super-water-repellent fractal surface made of alkylketene dimer; a water droplet on this surface has a contact angle as large as 174°.

Indices of landscape pattern

Abstract: Landscape ecology deals with the patterning of ecosystems in space. Methods are needed to quantify aspects of spatial pattern that can be correlated with ecological processes. The present paper develops three indices of pattern derived from information theory and fractal geometry. Using digitized maps, the indices are calculated for 94 quadrangles covering most of the eastern United States. The indices are shown to be reasonably independent of each other and to capture major features of landscape pattern. One of the indices, the fractal dimension, is shown to be correlated with the degree of human manipulation of the landscape.

Hofstadter’s butterfly and the fractal quantum Hall effect in moiré superlattices

Abstract: Moire superlattices arising in bilayer graphene coupled to hexagonal boron nitride provide a periodic potential modulation on a length scale ideally suited to studying the fractal features of the Hofstadter energy spectrum in large magnetic fields. In 1976 Douglas Hofstadter predicted that electrons in a lattice subjected to electrostatic and magnetic fields would show a characteristic energy spectrum determined by the interplay between two quantizing fields. The expected spectrum would feature a repeating butterfly-shaped motif, known as Hofstadter's butterfly. The experimental realization of the phenomenon has proved difficult because of the problem of producing a sufficiently disorder-free superlattice where the length scales for magnetic and electric field can truly compete with each other. Now that goal has been achieved — twice. Two groups working independently produced superlattices by placing ultraclean graphene (Ponomarenko et al.) or bilayer graphene (Kim et al.) on a hexagonal boron nitride substrate and crystallographically aligning the films at a precise angle to produce moire pattern superstructures. Electronic transport measurements on the moire superlattices provide clear evidence for Hofstadter's spectrum. The demonstrated experimental access to a fractal spectrum offers opportunities for the study of complex chaotic effects in a tunable quantum system. Electrons moving through a spatially periodic lattice potential develop a quantized energy spectrum consisting of discrete Bloch bands. In two dimensions, electrons moving through a magnetic field also develop a quantized energy spectrum, consisting of highly degenerate Landau energy levels. When subject to both a magnetic field and a periodic electrostatic potential, two-dimensional systems of electrons exhibit a self-similar recursive energy spectrum1. Known as Hofstadter’s butterfly, this complex spectrum results from an interplay between the characteristic lengths associated with the two quantizing fields1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10, and is one of the first quantum fractals discovered in physics. In the decades since its prediction, experimental attempts to study this effect have been limited by difficulties in reconciling the two length scales. Typical atomic lattices (with periodicities of less than one nanometre) require unfeasibly large magnetic fields to reach the commensurability condition, and in artificially engineered structures (with periodicities greater than about 100 nanometres) the corresponding fields are too small to overcome disorder completely11,12,13,14,15,16,17. Here we demonstrate that moire superlattices arising in bilayer graphene coupled to hexagonal boron nitride provide a periodic modulation with ideal length scales of the order of ten nanometres, enabling unprecedented experimental access to the fractal spectrum. We confirm that quantum Hall features associated with the fractal gaps are described by two integer topological quantum numbers, and report evidence of their recursive structure. Observation of a Hofstadter spectrum in bilayer graphene means that it is possible to investigate emergent behaviour within a fractal energy landscape in a system with tunable internal degrees of freedom.

Fractals and fractional calculus in continuum mechanics

Abstract: A. Carpinteri: Self-Similarity and Fractality in Microcrack Coalescence and Solid Rupture.- B. Chiaia: Experimental Determination of the Fractal Dimension of Microcrack Patterns and Fracture Surfaces.- P.D. Panagiotopoulos, O.K. Panagouli: Fractal Geometry in Contact Mechanics and Numerical Applications.- R. Lenormand: Fractals and Porous Media: from Pore to Geological Scales.- R. Gorenflo, F. Mainardi: Fractional Calculus: Integral and Differential Equations of Fractional Order.- R. Gorenflo: Fractional Calculus: some Numerical Methods.- F. Mainardi: Fractional Calculus: some Basic Problems in Continuum and Statistical Mechanics.