For Laplacians defined by measures on a bounded domain in ℝn, we prove analogues of the classical eigenvalue estimates for the standard Laplacian: lower bound of sums of eigenvalues by Li and Yau, and gaps of consecutive eigenvalues by Payne, Pólya and Weinberger. This work is motivated by the study of spectral gaps for Laplacians on fractals.

We construct a family of self-affine tiles in $\mathbb{R}^{d}$ ( $d\geqslant 2$ ) with noncollinear digit sets, which naturally generalizes a class studied originally by Q.-R. Deng and K.-S. Lau in $\mathbb{R}^{2}$ , and its extension to $\mathbb{R}^{3}$ by the authors. We obtain necessary and sufficient conditions for the tiles to be connected and for their interiors to be contractible.

For the class of self-similar measures in $\mathbb{R}^{d}$ with overlaps that are essentially of finite type, we set up a framework for deriving a closed formula for the $L^{q}$ -spectrum of the measure for $q\geq 0$ . This framework allows us to include iterated function systems that have different contraction ratios and those in higher dimension. For self-similar measures with overlaps, closed formulas for the $L^{q}$ -spectrum have only been obtained earlier for measures satisfying Strichartz’s second-order identities. We illustrate how to use our results to prove the differentiability of the $L^{q}$ -spectrum, obtain the multifractal dimension spectrum, and compute the Hausdorff dimension of the measure.

We formulate two natural but different extensions of the weak separation condition to infinite iterated function systems of conformal contractions with overlaps, and study the associated topological pressure functions. We obtain a formula for the Hausdorff dimension of the limit sets under these weak separation conditions.

We set up a framework for computing the spectral dimension of a class of one-dimensional self-similar measures that are defined by iterated function systems with overlaps and satisfy a family of second-order self-similar identities. As applications of our result we obtain the spectral dimension of important measures such as the infinite Bernoulli convolution associated with the golden ratio and convolutions of Cantor-type measures. The main novelty of our result is that the iterated function systems we consider are not post-critically finite and do not satisfy the well-known open set condition.

Croft, Falconer and Guy asked: what is the smallest integer $n$ such that an $n$-reptile in the plane has a hole? Motivated by this question, we describe a geometric method of constructing reptiles in $\mathbb{R}^d$, especially reptiles with holes. In particular, we construct, for each even integer $n\ge4$, an $n$-reptile in $\mathbb{R}^2$ with holes. We also answer some questions concerning the topological properties of a reptile whose interior consists of infinitely many components.

The notion of ‘finite type’ iterated function systems of contractive similitudes is introduced, and a scheme for computing the exact Hausdorff dimension of their attractors in the absence of the open set condition is described. This method extends a previous one by Lalley, and applies not only to the classes of self-similar sets studied by Edgar, Lalley, Rao and Wen, and others, but also to some new classes that are not covered by the previous ones.

The paper considers the iterated function systems of similitudes which satisfy a separation condition weaker than the open set condition, in that it allows overlaps in the iteration. Such systems include the well-known Bernoulli convolutions associated with the PV numbers, and the contractive similitudes associated with integral matrices. The latter appears frequently in wavelet analysis and the theory of tilings. One of the basic questions is studied: the absolute continuity and singularity of the self-similar measures generated by such systems. Various conditions to determine the dichotomy are given.