Billiards in nearly isosceles triangles

DOI10.3934/JMD.2009.3.159MaRDI QIDQ2268266zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors W. Patrick Hooper, Richard Evan Schwartz

Publication date 10 March 2010

Published in Journal of Modern Dynamics (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/0807.3498

zbMATH Keywords

isoceles trianglesperiodic orbitstriangular billiardstrigonometric seriesunfoldingsVeech triangles

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Combinatorial dynamics (types of periodic orbits) (37E15)

Abstract: We prove that any sufficiently small perturbation of an isosceles triangle has a periodic billiard path. Our proof involves the analysis of certain infinite families of Fourier series that arise in connection with triangular billiards, and reveals some self-similarity phenomena in irrational triangular billiards. Our analysis illustrates the surprising fact that billiards on a triangle near a Veech triangle is extremely complicated even though Billiards on a Veech triangle is very well understood.

Review text

This paper concerns periodic billiard paths in triangles. It is known that acute, right, and isosceles triangles always have periodic billiard paths. Moreover, if the triangle is isosceles, then there exists a periodic billiard path of combinatorial 2131. But this path is unstable. It disappears as soon as the triangle is perturbed in such a way that it is no longer isosceles. In this paper, the authors mainly prove that any sufficiently small perturbation of an isosceles triangle has a periodic billiard path. Their proof concerns analyzing of certain infinite families of Fourier series that arise in connection with triangular billiards and the proof shows some self-similarity phenomena in irrational triangular billiards. Their analysis illustrates that billiards on a triangle near a Veech triangle is extremely complicated even through billiards on a Veech triangle is well understood.

Recommendations

• Obtuse Triangular Billiards I: Near the (2, 3, 6) Triangle
• Periodic billiard paths in right triangles are unstable
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• Billiards and Rational Periodic Directions in Polygons
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Cited in

(13)

• Periodic billiard orbits in right triangles.
• Periodic reflecting paths in right triangles
• Renormalization of polygon exchange maps arising from corner percolation
• Periodic billiard paths in right triangles are unstable
• Billiard dynamics: An updated survey with the emphasis on open problems
• Regular simplices and periodic billiard orbits
• Obtuse Triangular Billiards I: Near the (2, 3, 6) Triangle
• Immersions and translation structures. I: The space of structures on the pointed disk
• Erratum: ``Billiards in nearly isosceles triangles
• A Triple of Projective Billiards
• Survey lecture on billiards
• Billiard dynamics: a survey with the emphasis on open problems
• Classification of periodic orbits for square and rectangular billiards

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