Outer Billiards with the Dynamics of a Standard Shift on a Finite Number of Invariant Curves

Abstract

We give a beautiful explicit example of a convex plane curve such that the outer billiard has a given finite number of invariant curves. Moreover, the dynamics on these curves is a standard shift. This example can be considered as an outer analog of the so-called Gutkin billiard tables. We test total integrability of these billiards, in the region between the two invariant curves. Next, we provide computer simulations on the dynamics in this region. At first glance, the dynamics looks regular but by magnifying the picture we see components of chaotic behavior near the hyperbolic periodic orbits. We believe this is a useful geometric example for coexistence of regular and chaotic behavior of twist maps.