We present a Melnikov method to analyze two-dimensional stable or unstable manifolds associated with a saddle point in three-dimensional non-volume preserving autonomous systems. The time-varying perturbed locations of such manifolds is obtained under very general, non-volume preserving and with arbitrary time-dependence, perturbations. In unperturbed situations with a two-dimensional heteroclinic manifold, we adapt our theory to quantify the splitting into a stable and unstable manifold, and thereby obtain a Melnikov function characterizing the time-varying locations of transverse intersections of these manifolds. Formulas for lobe volumes arising from such intersections, as well as the instantaneous flux across the broken heteroclinic manifold, are obtained in terms of the Melnikov function. Our theory has specific application to transport in fluid mechanics, where the flow is in three dimensions and flow separators are two-dimensional stable/unstable manifolds. We demonstrate our theory using both the classical and the swirling versions of Hill's spherical vortex.
We study the family of piecewise linear differential systems in the plane with two pieces separated by a cubic curve. Our main result is that 7 is a lower bound for the Hilbert number of this family. In order to get our main result, we develop the Melnikov functions for a class of nonsmooth differential systems, which generalizes, up to order 2, some previous results in the literature. Whereas the first order Melnikov function for the nonsmooth case remains the same as for the smooth one (i.e. the first order averaged function) the second order Melnikov function for the nonsmooth case is diffe…
We present a Melnikov type approach for establishing transversal intersections of stable/unstable manifolds of perturbed normally hyperbolic invariant manifolds (NHIMs). The method is based on a new geometric proof of the normally hyperbolic invariant manifold theorem, which establishes the existence of a NHIM, together with its associated invariant manifolds and bounds on their first and second derivatives. We do not need to know the explicit formulas for the homoclinic orbits prior to the perturbation. We also do not need to compute any integrals along such homoclinics. All needed bounds are…
We present a Melnikov type approach for establishing transversal intersections of stable/unstable manifolds of perturbed normally hyperbolic invariant manifolds. We do not need to know the explicit formulas for the homoclinic orbits prior to the perturbation. We also do not need to compute any integrals along such homoclinics. All needed bounds are established using rigorous computer assisted numerics. Lastly, and most importantly, the method establishes intersections for an explicit range of parameters, and not only for perturbations that are `small enough', as is the case in the classical Me…
We study perturbations of diffeomorphisms that have a saddle connection between a pair of normally hyperbolic invariant manifolds. We develop a first-order deformation calculus for invariant manifolds and show that a generalized Melnikov function or Melnikov displacement can be written in a canonical way. This function is defined to be a section of the normal bundle of the saddle connection. We show how our definition reproduces the classical methods of Poincaré and Melnikov and specializes to methods previously used for exact symplectic and volume-preserving maps. We use the method to detect …
We consider the planar circular restricted three-body problem (PCRTBP), as a model for the motion of a spacecraft relative to the Earth-Moon system. We focus on the Lagrange equilibrium points $L_1$ and $L_2$. There are families of Lyapunov periodic orbits around either $L_1$ or $L_2$, forming Lyapunov manifolds. There also exist homoclinic orbits to the Lyapunov manifolds around either $L_1$ or $L_2$, as well as heteroclinic orbits between the Lyapunov manifold around $L_1$ and the one around $L_2$. The motion along the homoclinic/heteroclinic orbits can be described via the scattering map, w…
In this work we consider a two-dimensional piecewise smooth system, defined in two domains separated by the switching manifold $x=0$. We assume that there exists a piecewise-defined continuous Hamiltonian that is a first integral of the system. We also suppose that the system possesses an invisible fold-fold at the origin and two heteroclinic orbits connecting two hyperbolic critical points on either side of $x=0$. Finally, we assume that the region closed by these heteroclinic connections is fully covered by periodic orbits surrounding the origin, whose periods monotonically increase as they …
We consider a mechanical system consisting of $n$ penduli and a $d$-dimensional generalized rotator subject to a time-dependent perturbation. The perturbation is not assumed to be either Hamiltonian, or periodic or quasi-periodic. The strength of the perturbation is given by a parameter $ε\in\mathbb{R}$. For all $|ε|$ sufficiently small, the augmented flow has a $(2d + 1)$-dimensional normally hyperbolic locally invariant manifold $\tildeΛ_ε$. We define a Melnikov vector, which gives the first order expansion of the displacement of the stable and unstable manifolds of $\tildeΛ_0$ under the per…
We give a surface for which the Ricci Flow applied to the metric will increase the topological entropy of the geodesic flow. Specifically, we first adapt the Melnikov method to apply to a Ricci Flow perturbation and then we construct a surface which is closely related to a surface of revolution, but does not quite have rotational symmetry. This is done by adapting the Liouville metric representation of a surface of revolution. The final steps of the Melnikov method require numerical integration.
We present a mechanism for the emergence of strange attractors (observable chaos) in a two-parameter periodically-perturbed family of differential equations on the plane. The two parameters are independent and act on different ways in the invariant manifolds of consecutive saddles in the cycle. When both parameters are zero, the flow exhibits an attracting heteroclinic cycle associated to two equilibria. The first parameter makes the two-dimensional invariant manifolds of consecutive saddles in the cycle to pull apart; the second forces transverse intersection. These relative positions may be …
We consider a non-autonomous dynamical system formed by coupling two piecewise-smooth systems in $\RR^2$ through a non-autonomous periodic perturbation. We study the dynamics around one of the heteroclinic orbits of one of the piecewise-smooth systems. In the unperturbed case, the system possesses two $C^0$ normally hyperbolic invariant manifolds of dimension two with a couple of three dimensional heteroclinic manifolds between them. These heteroclinic manifolds are foliated by heteroclinic connections between $C^0$ tori located at the same energy levels. By means of the {\em impact map} we pr…
We study bifurcation behavior in periodic perturbations of two-dimensional symmetric systems exhibiting codimension-two bifurcations with a double eigenvalue when the frequencies of the perturbation terms are small. We transform the periodically perturbed system to a simpler one which is a periodic perturbation of the normal form for codimension-two bifurcations with a double zero eigenvalue and symmetry, and apply the subharmonic and homoclinic Melnikov methods to analyze bifurcations occurring in the system. In particular, we show that there exist transverse homoclinic or heteroclinic orbits…
We study the problem of preservation of maximal canards for time discretized fast-slow systems with canard fold points. In order to ensure such preservation, certain favorable structure preserving properties of the discretization scheme are required. Conventional schemes do not possess such properties. We perform a detailed analysis for an unconventional discretization scheme due to Kahan. The analysis uses the blow-up method to deal with the loss of normal hyperbolicity at the canard point. We show that the structure preserving properties of the Kahan discretization for quadratic vector field…
In the present paper, non-singular Morse-Smale flows on closed orientable 3-manifolds under the assumption that among the periodic orbits of the flow there is only one saddle one and it is twisted are considered. An exhaustive description of the topology of such manifolds is obtained. Namely, it has been established that any manifold admitting such flows is either a lens space, or a connected sum of a lens space with a projective space, or Seifert manifolds with base homeomorphic to sphere and three singular fibers. Since the latter are simple manifolds, the result obtained refutes the result …
We show that in a rapidly mixing flow with an invariant measure, the time which is needed to hit a given section is related to a sort of conditional dimension of the measure at the section. The result is applied to the geodesic flow of compact variable negative sectional curvature manifolds, establishing a logarithm law for such kind of flow.
In the present paper the exhaustive topological classification of nonsingular Morse-Smale flows of $n$-manifolds with two limit cycles is presented. Hyperbolicity of periodic orbits implies that among them one is attracting and another is repelling. Due to Poincare-Hopf theorem Euler characteristic of closed manifold $M^n$ which admits the considered flows is equal to zero. Only torus and Klein bottle can be ambient manifolds for such flows in case of $n=2$. Authors established that there exist exactly two classes of topological equivalence of such flows of torus and three of the Klein bottle.…
We prove logarithm laws for unipotent flows on non-compact finite-volume hyperbolic manifolds. Our method depends on the estimate of norms of certain incomplete Eisenstein series.
We prove dynamical Borel Canteli Lemmas for discrete time homogenous flows hitting a sequence of shrinking targets in a hyperbolic manifold. These results apply to both diagonalizable and unipotent flows, and any family of measurable shrinking targets. As a special case, we establish logarithm laws for the first hitting times to shrinking balls and shrinking cusp neighborhoods, refining and improving on perviously known results.
We construct a topological invariant for a Morse-Smale flow on a 3-manifold and prove that the flows are topologically equivalent iff their invariants are same.
We construct Riemannian manifolds with completely integrable geodesic flows, in particular various nonhomogeneous examples. The methods employed are a modification of Thimm's method, Riemannian submersions and connected sums.
The paper is devoted to the study of topological properties, structure and classification of Morse flows with fixed points on the boundary of three-dimensional manifolds. We construct a complete topological invariant of a Morse flow, Pr-diagram, which is similar to the Heegaard diagram of a closed 3-manifold.
In this note we formulate a condition for complete, connected and non-compact Riemannian manifolds which implies no conjugate points in case that the geodesic flow is Anosov with respect to the Sasaki metric.
We give complete classification of C^2-regular and non-degenerate projectively Anosov flows on three dimensional manifolds. More precisely, we prove that such a flow on a connected manifold must be either an Anosov flow or represented as a finite union of $T^2 \times [0,1]$-models.
For each natural number n, we construct an example of a graph manifold supporting at least n different Anosov flows that are not orbit equivalent. Our construction is reminiscent of the Thurston-Handel construction: we cut a geodesic flow on a surface of constant negative curvature into two pieces, modify the flow in each piece by pulling back to finite covers, and glue together compatible pairs of pullback flows along their boundary tori to get many distinct flows on the resulting graph manifold.
In this paper we study the global behavior of the Ricci flow equation for two classes of homogeneous manifolds with two isotropy summands. Using methods of the qualitative theory of differential equations, we present the global phase portrait of such systems and derive some geometrical consequences on the structure of such manifolds under the action of the Ricci flow.
We give the complete classification of regular projectively Anosov flows on closed three-dimensional manifolds. More precisely, we show that such a flow must be either an Anosov flow or decomposed into a finite union of $T^2 \times I$-models. We also apply our method to rigidity problems of some group actions.
We study a continuous-time system that solves optimization problems over the set of orthonormal matrices, which is also known as the Stiefel manifold. The resulting optimization flow follows a path that is not always on the manifold but asymptotically lands on the manifold. We introduce a generalized Stiefel manifold to which we extend the canonical metric of the Stiefel manifold. We show that the vector field of the proposed flow can be interpreted as the sum of a Riemannian gradient on a generalized Stiefel manifold and a normal vector. Moreover, we prove that the proposed flow globally conv…
We introduce a natural subset of the unit tangent bundle of a convex projective manifold, the biproximal unit tangent bundle; it is closed and invariant under the geodesic flow, and we prove that the geodesic flow is topologically mixing on it whenever the manifold is irreducible. We also show that, for higher-rank, irreducible, compact convex projective manifolds, the geodesic flow is topologically mixing on each connected component of the non-wandering set.
A flow defined by a nonsingular smooth vector field $X$ on a closed manifold $M$ is said to be parameter rigid if given any real valued smooth function $f$ on $M$, there are a smooth funcion $g$ and a constant $c$ such that $f=X(g)+c$ holds. We show that the parameter rigid flows on closed orientable 3-manifolds are smoothly conjugate to Kronecker flows on the 3-torus with badly approximable slope.
This paper is a review of recent and classical results on integrable geodesic flows on Riemannian manifolds and topological obstructions to integrability. We also discuss some open problems.