Geometrical conditions for the stability of orbits in planar systems

Abstract

AbstractGiven a vector field X on the real plane, we study the influence of the curvature of the orbits of ẋ = X┴(x) in the stability of those of the system x˙ = X(x). We pay special attention to the case in which this curvature is negative in the whole plane. Under this assumption, we classify the possible critical points and give a criterion for a point to be globally asymptotically stable. In the general case, we also provide expressions for the first three derivatives of the Poincaré map associated to a periodic orbit in terms of geometrical quantities.