Pseudo-Euclidean billiards within confocal curves on the hyperboloid of one sheet (Q2223753): Difference between revisions

Mathematical billiards is a dynamical system where a particle moves freely within a domain and obeys the billiard law, where the angle of incidence equals angle of reflection, off the boundary. The behavior of such a mechanical system is dependent upon the geometric properties of the boundary and of the underlying space. In this paper, the authors consider a billiard problem for compact domains bounded by confocal conics on a hyperboloid of one sheet in the Minkowski space. The main inspiration for this work comes from the paper [\textit{A. P. Veselov}, J. Geom. Phys. 7, No. 1, 81--107 (1990; Zbl 0729.58029)], where billiards within confocal families on a hyperboloid of two sheets were considered. There, the restriction of the Minkowski metric gives rise to the geometry of Lobachevsky. Here, the authors study confocal families and the corresponding billiards on a hyperboloid of one sheet. They show that there are two types of confocal families in such setting. Using an algebro-geometric integration technique, they prove that the billiard within generalized ellipses of each type is integrable in the sense of Liouville. Further, they prove a generalization of the Poncelet theorem and derive Cayley-type conditions for periodic trajectories and explore geometric consequences. This paper is organized as follows : Section 1 is an introduction to the subject. In Section 2 the authors introduce the three-dimensional Minkowski space and its properties. They define and explore confocal families of conics as intersections of confocal families of cones with the hyperboloid of one sheet and analyze their properties. Interestingly enough, this leads to two different types of confocal families, and they give geometric description for each of them. Section 3 introduces billiards in Minkowski space and discusses basic properties of geodesics on the hyperboloid of one sheet. In Section 4 the authors provide a review of the relevant matrix factorization technique, adapted from the paper [loc. cit.], which is applied to these two scenarios and proves the explicit integrability of the two billiard systems. It is interesting to note that the Lax pair will produce a discrete trajectory for any initial conditions, even in the cases when the consecutive points cannot be connected by geodesics. Section 5 addresses the Cayley condition for periodic orbits and addresses a Poncelet-like theorem. Lastly, Section 6 addresses the unique geometric properties of each billiard system and provides examples.