Approximate limit cycles of coupled nonlinear oscillators with fractional derivatives

Abstract

In this paper, the homotopy analysis method (HAM) is presented to establish the accurate approximate analytical solutions for multi-degree-of-freedom (MDOF) coupled nonlinear oscillators with fractional derivatives. Approximate limit cycles (LCs) of two systems of the coupled fractional van der Pol (VDP) oscillators and the fractional damped Duffing resonator driven by a fractional VDP oscillator are exampled for illustrating the validity and great potential of the HAM. The presented approach can provide approximate LCs very accurately and efficiently compared with some direct simulation results. This method can keep high accuracy and efficiency for both weakly and strongly nonlinear problems with any given fractional order. Furthermore, it is capable of tracking unstable LCs which cannot be generated by some time-marching numerical algorithm. Based on the obtained results, we analyze effect of different fractional orders, coupling coefficient, and nonlinear coefficient of the coupled equations on amplitudes and frequencies of the LCs.