Critical points at infinity and blow up of solutions of autonomous polynomial differential systems via compactification (Q2368685)

The authors define admissible compactifications of the real \(n\)-space in the form of direction preserving bijections onto the unit ball. In this way, any polynomial \(n\)-vector field \[ dy/dt = f(y)\tag{1} \] is transformed into a topologically equivalent polynomial vector field on the unit ball, accompanied by a scalar differential equation for a corresponding transformation of the time variable and a further scalar differential equation that governs the way in which a given solution approaches the unit sphere, thus describing the growth of a solution \(y(t)\) as \(t\) tends to a boundary point of its maximal interval of existence. Using these results, the authors are able to give a definition of critical points at infinity that is independent of the compactification chosen. They also investigate the rate of blow up of a solution \(y(t)\) of (1) that tends to a critical point at infinity. They show that, under simple conditions, the growth is determined by the degree \(L\) of the vector polynomial \(f\). More precisely, if \((a,b)\) denotes the maximal interval of \(y(t)\), then the growth rate of \(y(t)\) is proportional to the power \(-1/(L-1)\) of \((b-t)\) respectively \((t-a)\).