Topological entropies of equivalent smooth flows

Wenxiang Sun, Todd Young, Yunhua Zhou

Published 2007-10-15Version 1

Two flows defined on a smooth manifold are equivalent if there exists a homeomorphism of the manifold that sends each orbit of one flow onto an orbit of the other flow while preserving the time orientation. The topological entropy of a flow is defined as the entropy of its time-1 map. While topological entropy is an invariant for equivalent homeomorphisms, finite non-zero topological entropy for a flow cannot be an invariant because its value is affected by time reparameterization. However, 0 and $\infty$ topological entropy are invariants for equivalent flows without fixed points. In equivalent flows with fixed points there exists a counterexample, constructed by Ohno, showing that neither 0 nor $\infty$ topological entropy is preserved by equivalence. The two flows constructed by Ohno are suspensions of a transitive subshift and thus are not differentiable. Note that a differentiable flow on a compact manifold cannot have $\infty$ entropy. These facts led Ohno in 1980 to ask the following: "Is 0 topological entropy an invariant for equivalent differentiable flows?" In this paper, we construct two equivalent $C^\infty$ smooth flows with a singularity, one of which has positive topological entropy while the other has zero topological entropy. This gives a negative answer to Ohno's question in the class $C^\infty$.