Essentially asymptotically stable homoclinic networks

Abstract

Melbourne [An example of a nonasymptotically stable attractor, Nonlinearity 4(3) (1991), pp. 835–844] discusses an example of a robust heteroclinic network that is not asymptotically stable but which has the strong attracting property called essential asymptotic stability. We establish that this phenomenon is possible for homoclinic networks, where all heteroclinic trajectories are symmetry related. Moreover, we study a transverse bifurcation from an asymptotically stable to an essentially asymptotically stable homoclinic network. The essentially asymptotically stable homoclinic network turns out to attract all nearby points except those on codimension-one stable manifolds of equilibria outside the homoclinic network.