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We study partition functions for the dimer model on families of finite graphs converging to infinite self-similar graphs and forming approximation sequences to certain well-known fractals. The graphs that we consider are provided by actions of finitely generated groups by automorphisms on rooted trees, and thus their edges are naturally labeled by the generators of the group. It is thus natural to consider weight functions on these graphs taking different values according to the labeling. We study in detail the well-known example of the Hanoi Towers group H-(3), closely related to the Sierpinski gasket. (c) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

We give a geometric approach to groups defined by automata via the notion of enriched dual of an inverse transducer. Using this geometric correspondence we first provide some finiteness results, then we consider groups generated by the dual of Cayley type of machines. Lastly, we address the problem of the study of the action of these groups on the boundary. We show that examples of groups having essentially free actions without critical points lie in the class of groups defined by the transducers whose enriched duals generate torsion-free semigroup. Finally, we provide necessary and sufficient conditions to have finite Schreier graphs on the boundary yielding to the decidability of the algorithmic problem of the existence of Schreier graphs on the boundary whose cardinalities are bounded from above by some fixed integer

In this paper we define a particular Markov chain on some combinatorial structures called orthogonal block structures. These structures include, as a particular case, the poset block structures, which can be naturally regarded as the set on which the generalized wreath product of permutation groups acts as the group of automorphisms. In this case, we study the associated Gelfand pairs together with the spherical functions

In this work we define two kinds of crested product for reversible Markov chains, which naturally appear as a generalization of the case of crossed and nested product, as in association schemes theory, even if we do a construction that seems to be more general and simple. Although the crossed and nested product are inspired by the study of Gelfand pairs associated with the direct and the wreath product of two groups, the crested products are a more general construction, independent from the Gelfand pairs theory, for which a complete spectral theory is developed. Moreover, the k-step transition probability is given. It is remarkable that these Markov chains describe some classical models (Ehrenfest diffusion model, Bernoulli–Laplace diffusion model, exclusion model) and give some generalization of them. As a particular case of nested product, one gets the classical Insect Markov chain on the ultrametric space. Finally, in the context of the second crested product, we present a generalization of this Markov chain to the case of many insects and give the corresponding spectral decomposition