The numerical computation of connecting orbits in dynamical systems: A rational spectral approach (Q1326692)

This paper presents a numerical method to approximate connecting orbits (i.e. orbits which connect two stationary points) in dynamical systems governed by ordinary differential equations. Since the posed problem is a boundary value problem in an infinite interval, usual procedures replace the infinite interval by a finite interval and modify the end conditions appropriately. However in the approach proposed here the problem is solved numerically in the infinite interval by using a spectral type method with a suitable set of test functions. Thus the difficulties derived from the truncation of the interval are avoided. As basis functions the authors take \(R_ n(t) = \cos(n \cot^{-1}(t))\), \(n = 0,1,\dots\) which are orthogonal in the real line with respect to the weighting function \((1 + t^ 2)^{-1}\) and the collocation points are \(t_ j = \cot(j\pi / (M + 1))\), \(j = 1,\dots,M\). Moreover a new phase condition, which does not require information from the previous step, is proposed. Under these conditions and using a suitable scaling factor the nonlinear equations arising in the spectral approximation are solved numerically by a standard subroutine. To show the efficiency of the new method two numerical examples derived from Huxley- and Lorentz-equations are considered. It is seen that even with a small number of collocation points the new method provides more accurate results and requires a lower computational cost than other standard methods.