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- HENON MAPPING WITH PASCAL
-
-
- (Excerpted from an article in Byte magazine, December
- 1986, authored by Gordon Hughes. Excerpt composed by
- Joe Carr of Big Blue and Cousins, Greater Victoria
- Personal Computer Users' Association, Victoria,
- British Columbia, CANADA.)
-
-
- In 1968, Michel Henon of the Institute for Astrophysics in Paris
- proposed a simple quadratic mapping of the plane as a model for
- the study of dynamical systems such as the motion of asteroids,
- satellites, or charged particles in an accelerator. Henon's
- mapping...is based on George Birkhoff's discovery in 1917 that
- you can reduce the study of conservative systems with two degrees
- of freedom to the study of area-preserving mappings of the plane.
- Thus, Henon set out to find an area-preserving mapping that was
- simple in nature but retained all the characteristics of more
- complicated mappings.
-
- Although the mapping Henon proposed is easy to describe and
- program, it yields results of great complexity. Since Henon
- mappings simulate the behavior of physical systems, they indicate
- that many such systems are more complex than previously imagined.
- Mathematicians and physicists are only beginning to understand
- the nature of this complexity and what it says about physical
- systems such as the asteroid belt. In a series of results during
- the years 1954 to 1963, mathematicians A.N. Kolmogorov, V.I.
- Arnold, and J. Moser provided a partial explanation for the
- strange behavior of such systems. These results are now known as
- the KAM theorem. It is an important theorem in modern physics
- and has aroused a great deal of interest.
-
- What is the KAM theorem?
-
- The KAM theorem explains mathematically what happens when a small
- external force disturbs a stable dynamical system, such as a
- satellite in orbit around the Earth...The theorem shows that
- under small disturbances a stable system undergoes changes but
- remains stable except for microscopically small bands of
- potential instability corresponding to "resonances" between the
- original system and the disturbance...The KAM theorem proves that
- as long as the disturbances remain small the relative size of
- these resonance bands is insignificant and stability is assured.
-
- [You should run HENON2.COM using a phase angle A = 1.111 radians,
- scale -1.2 to 1.2 on both X and Y axes, as an example explained
- below.]
-
- (The above example of Henon mapping) simulates a system
- undergoing successively larger disturbances. The inner curves
- represent a system's reaction to small disturbances and show that
- the system is altered slightly but remains stable...However, if
-
- HENON MAPPING WITH PASCAL Page 2
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-
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- the disturbance increases in magnitude past a certain threshold
- value, some of the resonance bands will suddenly widen...the
- first noticeable widening in the example is the resonance band
- with six "islands", indicating a 1/6 resonance. An asteroid with
- a period 1/6 that of Jupiter would find itself on such a
- resonance band.
-
- With even higher disturbances, the resonance bands might dominate
- the system's behavior, as indicated by the outer band of seven
- large islands. The scattered dots around these islands indicate
- areas of instability. Similar areas exist between the islands of
- each resonance band. An asteroid caught in one of these regions
- could experience erratic behavior and even be thrown from its
- orbit, as indicated by the faint dots escaping around (the
- example). Such resonances are believed to cause the Kirkwood
- gaps in the asteroid belt.
-
- Scientists have known for some time that resonances between two
- interacting forces can lead to instability in the form of erratic
- or extreme behavior...the KAM theorem shows that, at least for
- small interactions, the resonances don't lead to abrupt changes
- in behavior. The system "stretches" smoothly and doesn't break.
-
-
- CREATING A HENON MAPPING
-
- A Henon mapping is an area-preserving map of the plane given by:
-
- X(n+1) = X(n) * cos(A) - ( Y(n) - X(n)**2 ) * sin(A)
- Y(n+1) = X(n) * sin(A) + ( Y(n) - X(n)**2 ) * cos(A)
-
- Here, A is a fixed constant called the Phase Angle. First choose
- a value for A between 0 and pi. (Values outside this range are
- acceptable, but you won't obtain any new mappings.) Next, choose
- an initial point (X(0),Y(0)) and use it to compute (X(1),Y(1)),
- then (X(2),Y(2)), etc. This generates one orbit of the Henon
- mapping. Typically, it will resemble a closed curve after a few
- hundred iterations. In the example, A is 1.111, and the inner
- curve has 700 points generated with a starting value of
- (X(0),Y(0)) = (.098,.061).
-
- Next, choose a starting point (X(0),Y(0)) for the second orbit
- and continue. A typical mapping might contain 15 to 20 orbits,
- depending on the detail desired. The example contains 38 orbits.
- You can use any value for the starting point, but for X(0) >
- 1/sin(A), the successive points grow rapidly. For example, with
- A = 1.111, any starting point beyond X(0) = 1.116 grows quickly,
- and the orbit degenerates to a few points on the screen.
-
-
- HENON MAPPING WITH PASCAL Page 3
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-
-
- A program to generate these mappings will have two nested loops;
- the outer loop to choose the starting values (X(0),Y(0)), and the
- inner loop to generate the orbit. (see HENON2.PAS)
-
- Note that the mappings have a symmetry about a line that makes an
- angle of A/2 with the positive X axis. For the example, this
- angle is 1.111/2 radians, which is about 32 degrees.
-
-
- SUMMARY
-
- The theoretical study of stability is one of the more difficult
- fields of mathematics, and results such as the KAM theorem are of
- a highly technical nature. Yet, through the medium of computer
- simulation using iterative mappings such as the Henon mappings,
- you can gain significant insight into the nature of these
- studies. This visual insight can be a powerful tool. Most of
- the laws of physics were obtained through keen observation
- followed by mathematical analysis. Now anyone with a
- microcomputer has a window from which to observe some of the more
- exotic behavior that underlies the world.
-
-
- NOTES TO USERS OF THIS SOFTWARE
-
- For a more complete reference on this subject, please refer to
- the article "Henon Mapping With Pascal" by Gordon Hughes, in Byte
- magazine, December 1986 issue, copyright (c) 1986 by McGraw-Hill
- Inc, One Phoenix Mill Lane, Peterborough, New Hampshire, USA
- 03458. This excerpt is used with the kind permission of McGraw-
- Hill; the program HENON2 is distributed courtesy of Gordon
- Hughes, the author.
-
- This package was assembled by:
-
- Big Blue and Cousins,
- The Greater Victoria Personal Computer Users' Association,
- Box 5365, Station B,
- Victoria, British Columbia
- CANADA V8R 6S4
-