Graph theory and piecewise smooth dynamical systems of arbitrary dimension (Q1125167)

The authors present a method for finding all possible classes of periodic responses in a given piecewise smooth system and extend this approach to systems of arbitrary dimension. The authors apply their general approach to two particular problems, that is dynamics of the confined rocking block and a heat exchanger respectively. In the latter case the number of possible periodic orbits is shown to be the Fibonacci sequence. To this end the authors systematically use ideas from graph theory.