Separation with restricted families of sets

Given a finite $n$-element set $X$, a family of subsets ${\mathcal F}\subset 2^X$ is said to separate $X$ if any two elements of $X$ are separated by at least one member of $\mathcal F$. It is shown that if $|\mathcal F|>2^{n-1}$, then one can select $\lceil\log n\rceil+1$ members of $\mathcal F$ that separate $X$. If $|\mathcal F|\ge \alpha 2^n$ for some $0<\alpha<1/2$, then $\log n+O(\log\frac1{\alpha}\log\log\frac1{\alpha})$ members of $\mathcal F$ are always sufficient to separate all pairs of elements of $X$ that are separated by some member of $\mathcal F$. This result is generalized to simultaneous separation in several sets. Analogous questions on separation by families of bounded Vapnik-Chervonenkis dimension and separation of point sets in ${\mathbb{R}}^d$ by convex sets are also considered.Comment: 13 page

On restricted families of projections in R^3

We study projections onto non-degenerate one-dimensional families of lines and planes in $\mathbb{R}^{3}$. Using the classical potential theoretic approach of R. Kaufman, one can show that the Hausdorff dimension of at most $1/2$-dimensional sets $B \subset \mathbb{R}^{3}$ is typically preserved under one-dimensional families of projections onto lines. We improve the result by an $\varepsilon$, proving that if $\dim_{\mathrm{H}} B = s > 1/2$, then the packing dimension of the projections is almost surely at least $\sigma(s) > 1/2$. For projections onto planes, we obtain a similar bound, with the threshold $1/2$ replaced by $1$. In the special case of self-similar sets $K \subset \mathbb{R}^{3}$ without rotations, we obtain a full Marstrand type projection theorem for one-parameter families of projections onto lines. The $\dim_{\mathrm{H}} K \leq 1$ case of the result follows from recent work of M. Hochman, but the $\dim_{\mathrm{H}} K > 1$ part is new: with this assumption, we prove that the projections have positive length almost surely.Comment: 33 pages. v2: small changes, including extended introduction and additional references. To appear in Proc. London Math. So

Sixty Years of Fractal Projections

Sixty years ago, John Marstrand published a paper which, among other things, relates the Hausdorff dimension of a plane set to the dimensions of its orthogonal projections onto lines. For many years, the paper attracted very little attention. However, over the past 30 years, Marstrand's projection theorems have become the prototype for many results in fractal geometry with numerous variants and applications and they continue to motivate leading research.Comment: Submitted to proceedings of Fractals and Stochastics