Hölder parameterization of iterated function systems and a self-affine phenomenon

Abstract: We investigate the H\"older geometry of curves generated by iterated function systems (IFS) in a complete metric space. A theorem of Hata from 1985 asserts that every connected attractor of an IFS is locally connected and path-connected. We give a quantitative strengthening of Hata's theorem. First we prove that every connected attractor of an IFS is $(1/s)$-H\"older path-connected, where $s$ is the similarity dimension of the IFS. Then we show that every connected attractor of an IFS is parameterized by a $(1/\alpha)$-H\"older curve for all $\alpha>s$. At the endpoint, $\alpha=s$, a theorem of Remes from 1998 already established that connected self-similar sets in Euclidean space that satisfy the open set condition are parameterized by $(1/s)$-H\"older curves. In a secondary result, we show how to promote Remes' theorem to self-similar sets in complete metric spaces, but in this setting require the attractor to have positive $s$-dimensional Hausdorff measure in lieu of the open set condition. To close the paper, we determine sharp H\"older exponents of parameterizations in the class of connected self-affine Bedford-McMullen carpets and build parameterizations of self-affine sponges. An interesting phenomenon emerges in the self-affine setting. While the optimal parameter $s$ for a self-similar curve in $\mathbb{R}^n$ is always at most the ambient dimension $n$, the optimal parameter $s$ for a self-affine curve in $\mathbb{R}^n$ may be strictly greater than $n$.