Global dynamics of hybrid van der Pol-Rayleigh oscillators (Q2077794)

Consider the planar polynomial system \[ \frac{{dx}}{{dt}} = y, \quad \frac{{dy}}{{dt}} = -x -y( \alpha + x^2 +\beta y^2),\tag{1} \] where \( \alpha\) and \(\beta \) are real parameters. System (1) contains the van der Pol term \(x^2y\) and the Rayleigh term \( \beta y^3\); therefore, it is called the hybrid van der Pol-Rayleigh system. The authors study the global phase portrait of System (1) in dependence on the parameters \( \alpha \) and \( \beta \). For this goal they determine the bifurcation curves in the parameter plane which define 7 simply connected regions, where each region corresponds to a structurally stable phase portrait of System (1) in the Poincaré disk. The studies show that the hybrid van der Pol-Rayleigh system can have more than one limit cycle. Results about the location of these limit cycles are presented.