Chaos

theory
for a bit, and spend some time using what we’ve learned so far to investi-
gate something interesting. We’ll start with something familiar: the simple

Simple harmonic oscillator

pendulum.
A simple pendulum, as you probably remember from introductory physics,
consists of a point mass on a massless string as shown in figure 5.0. If the

Figure 5.0: A simple pendulum

Angular position versus time for a simple pendulum. The red curve
Figure 5.1: Angular position vs time for a simple pendulum. The red curve
is obtained using
is obtained usingthe S.H.O equation, on
scipy.integrate.odeint() the green5.1,
equation curve is the
the green result
curve is of
the small-angle approximation.
the result of the g/L = 1. Lg = 1.
small-angle approximation.

˙ which would be consistent

This damping depends on the angular velocity ✓,
Damped simple
Figure 5.2: pendulum,
Damped with g/L
simple pendulum, with =Lg 1=and
1 anddamping parameter
damping parameter
β = 0.5.
= 0.5.

This motion is more realistic, but eventually everything just stops, which
is boring. Let’s add in a driving term as well, just to keep things going.
g
✓¨ = sin ✓ ✓˙ + A cos(!t) (5.3)
L
5.1 Phase Space 113

A damped,
Figure 5.3: Adriven
damped,pendulum. Here AHere
driven pendulum. = 1.5,
A =ω1.5,
= 0.667, and
! = 0.9, andβ = 0.5.
= 0.5.

helpful to “wrap” the data: any time the data is more than ⇡ (or less than
⇡) we subtract (add) 2⇡ so that the data range is limited to the range ±⇡.
 Data
Figure 5.4: Same “wrapped”
calculation as for to the
figure range
5.3, {−πdata
but with : π}“wrapped” to
the range { ⇡ : ⇡}

Although a phase plot lacks the time information of the type of plots
we’ve been using so far, it gives additional insight into the overall long-term
Plots of position (and velocity) vs. time, with corresponding phase plot.
These two plots
Figure 5.5:show
Plotsthe same system,
of position undergoing
(and velocity) the
vs. time, same
with motion.
corresponding
phase plot. These two plots show the same system, undergoing the same
motion.
116 Chaos

Attractor for the pendulum

Figure 5.6: Attractor for the pendulum in figure 5.3.

5.2 Poincaré Plots

As helpful as phase space is, it still can overwhelm us with the volume of
5.2 Poincaré Plots 117

Period-doubling
Figure in a driven
5.7: Period-doubling damped
in a driven damped pendulum.
pendulum.

leads to the chaotic motion.

To help understand the meaning of the Poincaré plot, keep in mind that
the system will be somewhere on the Poincaré plot at that moment in the
 Poincare
Figure 5.8: Poincaré plots
plots corresponding to figure 5.7

E r i c Ayars
 Poincare plot for the damped driven pendulum in chaotic motion,
Figure 5.9: Poincaré plot for the damped driven pendulum in chaotic motion,
at phase angle 0.
at phase angle 0.

# a c t u a l l y , j u s t i n s i s t t h a t omega = 1 . l e a v e i t o u t o f c a l c u l a t i o n s b e l o w .
beta = 0.5 # damping f a c t o r
amp = 1 . 2 # Driving torque amplitude