English

On Null-homology and stationary sequences

Probability 2022-01-13 v2 Dynamical Systems

Abstract

The concept of homology, originally developed as a useful tool in algebraic topology, has by now become pervasive in quite different branches of mathematics. The notion particularly appears quite naturally in ergodic theory in the study of measure-preserving transformations arising from various group actions or, equivalently, the study of stationary sequences when adopting a probabilistic perspective as in this paper. Our purpose is to give a new and relatively short proof of the coboundary theorem due to Schmidt (1977) which provides a sharp criterion that determines (and rules out) when two stationary processes belong to the same \emph{null-homology equivalence class}. We also discuss various aspects of null-homology within the class of Markov random walks, compare null-homology with a formally stronger notion which we call {\it strict-sense null-homology}. Finally, we also discuss some concrete cases where the notion of null-homology turns up in a relevant manner.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1910.07378,
  title  = {On Null-homology and stationary sequences},
  author = {Gerold Alsmeyer and Chiranjib Mukherjee},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1910.07378},
  year   = {2022}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-23T11:45:28.641Z