Existence of infinite non-Birkhoff periodic orbits for area-preserving monotone twist maps of cylinders (Q1589765)

Let \({\mathbb{R}}/{\mathbb{Z}} \times {\mathbb{R}}\) be a cylinder with coordinates \(x\) and \(y\), \(x\equiv x+1\), and let \(\overline{f}\) be an exact twist diffeomorphism with lift \((x_1 ,y_1)=f(x_0 ,y_0)\). An orbit \(\{ (x_n ,y_n)\}_{n\in {\mathbb{Z}}}\) is of Birkhoff type if \(f\) preserves the order on the set \(\{ x_n +m: n,m\in {\mathbb{Z}} \}\). The orbit is periodic of type \((q,p)\in {\mathbb{Z}}\times {\mathbb{Z}}_+\) if \(x_q=x_0 +p\), \(y_q =y_0\). The quotient \({p \over q}\) is the rotation number of the periodic orbit. Boyland and Hall observed that the existence of a non-Birkhoff periodic orbit is linked to the non-existence of invariant curve for some rotation number. In the present paper the authors impose additional conditions on \(f\) and obtain the following result: if \(f\) has no invariant curve with rotation number \(\omega \in {\mathbb{R}}-{\mathbb{Q}}\) then it has infinitely many non-Birkhoff periodic orbits with the same rotation number \({p \over q}\) (close to \(\omega\)). The proof uses Mather's variational techniques. More discussions on the consequences of the non-existence of an invariant curve can be found in [\textit{S. Angenent}, Twist mappings and their applications, 1-5 (1992; Zbl 0769.58036)].