Multiple separatrix crossing in multi-degree-of-freedom Hamiltonian flows (Q1345449)

The author studies separatrix crossing in near-integrable \(k\)-degree-of- freedom Hamiltonian flows, \(2< k < \infty\), whose unperturbed phase portraits contain separatrices in \(n\) degrees of freedom, \(1 < n < k\). Each of the unperturbed separatrices can be recast as a codimension-one separatrix in the \(2k\)-dimensional phase space, and the collection of these separatrices takes on a variety of geometrical possibilities in the reduced representation of Poincaré section on the energy surface. Generally the separatrices are available to the Poincaré section and each separatrix may be completely isolated from all other separatrices or intersect transversely with one or more of the other available separatrices. For completely isolated separatrices, transitions across broken separatrices are described for each separatrix by the single- separatrix crossing theory of Wiggins as modified by the author. For intersecting separatrices, a possible violation of a normal hyperbolicity condition complicates the analysis by preventing the use of a persistence and smoothness theory for compact normally hyperbolic invariant manifolds and their local stable and unstable manifolds. For certain classes of multi-degree-of-freedom flows, however, a local persistence and smoothness result is straightforward, and the author studies the global implications of such a local result.