Reduction of underdetermined systems of ordinary differential equations. III (Q416801)

The author continues to study underdetermined systems of quasi-linear autonomous ordinary differential equations satisfying a constant rank condition. In the current article the notion of a morphism between two such systems and subsequently the notion of a subsystem are introduced: a morphism is a smooth mapping between the respective spaces of dependent variables such that the image of each solution of the first system is a solution of the second system; a subsystem is obtained, if a parametrisation is a morphism. It is shown that a special kind of subsystem consisting only of one equation always exists. As in the previous articles, the proof is based on a reformulation as an equivalent Pfaffian system.