Iterated function systems with super-exponentially close cylinders

Abstract: Several important conjectures in Fractal Geometry can be summarised as follows: If the dimension of a self-similar measure in $\mathbb{R}$ does not equal its expected value, then the underlying iterated function system contains an exact overlap. In recent years significant progress has been made towards these conjectures. Hochman proved that if the Hausdorff dimension of a self-similar measure in $\mathbb{R}$ does not equal its expected value, then there are cylinders which are super-exponentially close at all small scales. Several years later, Shmerkin proved an analogous statement for the $L^q$ dimension of self-similar measures in $\mathbb{R}$. With these statements in mind, it is natural to wonder whether there exist iterated function systems that do not contain exact overlaps, yet there are cylinders which are super-exponentially close at all small scales. In this paper we show that such iterated function systems do exist. In fact we prove much more. We prove that for any sequence $(\epsilon_n){n=1}^{\infty}$ of positive real numbers, there exists an iterated function system ${\phi_i}{i\in \mathcal{I}}$ that does not contain exact overlaps and $$\min\left{|\phi_{\mathbf{a}}(0)-\phi_{\mathbf{b}}(0)|: \mathbf{a},\mathbf{b}\in \mathcal{I}^n,\, \mathbf{a}\neq \mathbf{b},\, r_{\mathbf{a}}=r_{\mathbf{b}}\right}\leq \epsilon_n$$ for all $n\in \mathbb{N}.$