Structure of attractors for (a,b)-continued fraction transformations

Abstract: We study a two-parameter family of one-dimensional maps and related (a,b)-continued fractions suggested for consideration by Don Zagier. We prove that the associated natural extension maps have attractors with finite rectangular structure for the entire parameter set except for a Cantor-like set of one-dimensional Lebesgue zero measure that we completely describe. We show that the structure of these attractors can be "computed" from the data (a,b), and that for a dense open set of parameters the Reduction theory conjecture holds, i.e. every point is mapped to the attractor after finitely many iterations. We also show how this theory can be applied to the study of invariant measures and ergodic properties of the associated Gauss-like maps.