Bifurcations of zeros in translated families of functions and applications (Q2070352)

The authors study the creation of zeros in some families of functions, motivated by the study of bifurcations of critical points of the period function in a neighborhood of a polycycle. The key problem is the breaking of the separatrices of the polycycle. In previous works the authors have given a conjectural bifurcation diagram of the critical points of the period function of Loud systems. The present paper deals with this problem. The authors state their results first in a general setting and then they apply it to Loud systems. \newline In a general setting, the authors study an equation of the form \[ \Delta (s; \varepsilon, \mu) \, =\, F_1(s,\mu) - F_2(s+\varepsilon; \mu) \, = \, 0, \] where \(s=0\) corresponds to the polycycle, \(s \geq 0\) parametrizes the monodromic region, \(\varepsilon \approx 0\) is the parameter controlling the breaking of the separatrix and \(\mu\) regroups all other parameters of the family, in a neighborhood of a parameter value \(\mu_0\). The first main result of the paper, namely Theorem A, studies the number of zeros of such a function \(\Delta (s; \varepsilon, \mu)\) under some conditions on the functions \(F_1\) and \(F_2\). They consider the maximal number of zeros born in a neighborhood of fixed parameters. The cyclicity counts the number of only those which survive when the size of neighborhood in phase and parameter space tend to zero. A precise definition of these concepts can be found in the paper. The authors prove sufficient conditions for \(\mu_0\) not being a bifurcation value. Moreover, they also give sufficient conditions to ensure that the cyclicity is \(1\). \newline The authors apply this main result to study the bifurcation diagram of the period function of the dehomogenized Loud family of quadratic centers: \[ \dot{x} \, = \, -y+xy, \quad \dot{y} \, = \, x + Dx^2+Fy^2. \] Along the line \(\{ F + D = 0, \, F \not\in [0, 1]\}\) a heteroclinic connection between hyperbolic saddles bounding the period annulus occurs. The connection is broken when leaving this line in the space of parameters. Theorem B brooms all the possibilities in this case and characterizes when the cyclicity is \(0\), \(1\) or \(2\). Theorem C gives a more precise description of the bifurcations occurring at \((D, F) = (-2, 2)\).