EM2: Chaos

Jakub Jagiello (6642331)

This experiment looks at an electrical system that exhibits chaos. This was done with the use
of a chaos box, which contains nothing more than a rectification circuit. A varied input
voltage (𝑉𝑖𝑛 ) is sent into the box using an oscilloscope and a distinct path or outcome is
measured as the output voltage (𝑉𝑜𝑢𝑡 ).
The aims of this experiment were to familiarize ourselves with the properties of chaos and
chaotic systems and to find the two universal Feigenbaum numbers, δ and α through the
use of a Poincare plot.

Results:
When conducting the experiment, a constant frequency of 18kHz was used and the input
voltage varied between, 0.47±0.02 V and 2.44±0.06 V this resulted in a measured output
voltage between ~30 and ~100 V. The experiment looked specifically at the bifurcation points
at which the number of probable outcomes doubled each time. The first bifurcation point was
at 𝑉𝑖𝑛 of 0.47±0.02V and 𝑉𝑜𝑢𝑡 of 67±1V. The second point had two distinct outcomes at the
same 𝑉𝑖𝑛 of 2.0±0.1V with two values of 𝑉𝑜𝑢𝑡 at 40.4±0.7V and 93.8±0.5V. The final bifurcation
ha its outcomes once again doubled at a 𝑉𝑖𝑛 of 2.4±0.1V with 4 distinct 𝑉𝑜𝑢𝑡 ’s at 35.4±0.3V,
50.4±0.8V, 94.0±0.8V and 96.6±0.5V. The errors in these values were found using the
standard deviation of the sample and can be seen as error bars in fig 1. The two Feigenbaum
numbers, δ and α were found to be 3.6±0.3 and 3.6±0.1 respectively, the errors in these were
found by propagating the errors in the bifurcation points.
105

95

85
Output voltage (V)

75
a
65

55

45
b
35
𝛥1 𝛥2
25
0.4 0.9 1.4 1.9 2.4
Input voltage (V)

Fig1. The Poincare plot of 𝑉𝑖𝑛 against 𝑉𝑜𝑢𝑡 showing the bifurcation points, the values of δ and α were found
using 𝛥1 , 𝛥2 for δ and a and b for α.
Conclusions:
The Feigenbaum numbers were found to be 3.6±0.3 and 3.6±0.1. looking at the value for δ
of 3.6±0.3 and comparing to the literature value of 4.7, the value is in the same magnitude
as the literature which shows that perhaps with more precision and more data this could be
improved to a closer value. The literature value for α is 2.5 and the value found in the
experiment was 3.6±0.1. This is also within the same order of magnitude and is a good
approximation of the literature. The values and errors in these values were found using
averages and standard deviations which give a good amount of precision. As the data was
fed straight into the computer a measurement error is either non-existent or negligible
therefore it is not considered when computing the error. The error could also be due to the
sensitivity of the knob on the equipment, it was difficult to have small changes in the input
voltage. Finally there is a slight error between the bifurcation points as the point at which
this occurs was difficult to pinpoint.
In general Chaos theory is used in many different applications of physics, one very
interesting property is that it is a very good source of ‘randomness’ this causes it to be used
extensively in cryptography as an encryption algorithm. One such example is the image
encryption that utilizes a wavelet transform.[2] One famous example is the Cloudflare lava
lamp-based image encryption, it uses a wall of lava lamps to produce a close to true random
image that is turned into a number and a respective encryption key for future use.[3]
The experiment could be improved by using a different way of changing the input voltage
like a button as opposed to a knob. Another way would be to closely look at the python
program that was included, this would give a point of comparison to the values taken in the
experiment but unfortunately, we weren’t able to produce sufficiently good results to
compare to.

References:
[1] - Undergraduate laboratory script “EM2: Chaos”, downloaded from www.surrey.ac.uk on 13th
November 2022

[2] - Chaos Theory and its Potential for Cryptography. (n.d.). Engineering Education (EngEd) Program
| Section. https://www.section.io/engineering-education/chaos-cryptography/

[3] - (n.d.). How do lava lamps help with Internet encryption? https://www.cloudflare.com/en-
gb/learning/ssl/lava-lamp-encryption/