Fixed-point indices, homoclinic contacts, and dynamics of injective planar maps (Q1591625)

The paper deals with a \(C^1\) orientation preserving diffeomorphism \(f: S \to S\) of an open set \(S \subset \mathbb{R}^2\) with fixed point \(p\) that is a direct saddle; that is, the derivative of \(f\) at \(p\) has eigenvalues \(\lambda, \mu\) such that \(0 < \lambda < 1 < \mu.\) A generalization of homoclinic points for \(p\), the so-called homoclinic contact is introduced. The author proves that, when a fixed point \(p\) admits homoclinic contact, there exists a fixed-point free Jordan curve \(J \subset S\) whose index under \(f\) is \(1\). The curve \(J\) surrounds a block \(B\) of fixed points (i.e., \(B\) is open and closed in \(\text{Fix}(f)\)) that is disjoint from \(p\) and has fixed point index \(1\). In particular, there exists a fixed point different from \(p\). It is shown that many results on planar homeomorphisms generalize to homologically nilpotent injective maps in planar surfaces.