The limit cycles of the Higgins-Selkov systems (Q2230555)

The authors study the planar system \[ \begin{array}{l} \frac{{dx}}{{dt}} = 1 - x y^n,\\ \frac{{dy}}{{dt}} = ay(-1+ xy^{n-1}), \end{array}\tag{1} \] which has been used by [\textit{J. Higgins}, ``A chemical mechanism for oscillation of glycolytic intermediates in yeast cells'', Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 51, No. 6, 989--994 (1964; \url{doi: 10.1073/pnas.51.6.989})] and \textit{E. E. Sel'kov} [``Self-oscillations in glycolysis. I: A simple kinetic model'', Eur. J. Biochem. 4, No. 1, 79--86 (1968; \url{doi:10.1111/j.1432-1033.1968.tb00175.x})] to describe glycolytic oscillations. The authors prove the following result.\\ Theorem. For every positive integer \(n \ge 3\), there exists a unique constant \( a^* \in (1/(n-1), (2n-1)/(2n-2))\) such that system (1) has no periodic orbits when \( a \in (-\infty, 1/(n-1)] \cup [ a^*, + \infty)\) and has a unique limit cycle when \(a \in (1/(n-1), a^*)\). For the proof, the authors transform (1) into a generalized Liénard system and apply corresponding results and techniques.