Unique expansions of real numbers

It was discovered some years ago that there exist non-integer real numbers q>1 for which only one sequence (ci) of integers ci∈[0,q) satisfies the equality . The set of such “univoque numbers” has a rich topological structure, and its study revealed a number of unexpected connections with measure theory, fractals, ergodic theory and Diophantine approximation.In this paper we consider for each fixed q>1 the set Uq of real numbers x having a unique representation of the form with integers ci belonging to [0,q). We carry out a detailed topological study of these sets. For instance, we characterize their closures, and we determine those bases q for which Uq is closed or even a Cantor set. We also study the set consisting of all sequences (ci) of integers ci∈[0,q) such that . We determine the numbers r>1 for which the map (defined on (1,∞)) is constant in a neighborhood of r and the numbers q>1 for which is a subshift or a subshift of finite type.