On the Interplay of Direct Topological Factorizations and Cellular Automata Dynamics on Beta-Shifts

Abstract

We consider the range of possible dynamics of cellular automata (CA) on two-sided beta-shifts [Formula: see text] and its relation to direct topological factorizations. We show that any reversible CA [Formula: see text] has an almost equicontinuous direction whenever [Formula: see text] is not sofic. This has the corollary that non-sofic beta-shifts are topologically direct prime, i.e. they are not conjugate to direct topological factorizations [Formula: see text] of two nontrivial subshifts [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text]. We also give a simple criterion to determine whether [Formula: see text] is conjugate to [Formula: see text] for a given integer [Formula: see text] and a given real [Formula: see text] when [Formula: see text] is a subshift of finite type. When [Formula: see text] is strictly sofic, we show that such a conjugacy is not possible at least when [Formula: see text] is a quadratic Pisot number of degree [Formula: see text]. We conclude by using direct factorizations to give a new proof for the classification of reversible multiplication automata on beta-shifts with integral base and ask whether nontrivial multiplication automata exist when the base is not an integer.