Finding homoclinic and heteroclinic contours of singular points of nonlinear systems of ordinary differential equations (Q1776225)

The paper considers a smooth family of nonlinear autonomous differential equations \[ \dot x=F(x,\mu),\quad x\in\mathbb R^n, \mu\in\mathbb R^k, \tag{1} \] depending on the parameter vector \(\mu\). It is assumed that (1) has the hyperbolic singular points \(\bar x(\mu)\) and \(\tilde x(\mu)\) for \(\mu\in U\subset\mathbb R^k\). The authors suggest a method for approximate finding bifurcation surfaces (curves) in the parameter space and estimating their codimension for the following separatrix contours of singular points: a heteroclinic contour joining two saddle-nodes, two saddle-foci, or a saddle-node with a saddle-focus; a homoclinic saddle-focus separatrix loop; and a homoclinic saddle-node separatrix loop. The results are illustrated by examples of finding all contours mentioned above for the three-dimensional Lorenz system: \[ \dot x=\sigma(y-x),\quad\dot y=x(r-z)-y,\quad\dot z=xy-bz, \] where \(\sigma\), \(b\), and \(r\) are viewed as parameters.