Related papers: Outer Billiards and the Pinwheel Map
We discuss a recent result by C. Culter: every polygonal outer billiard has a periodic trajectory.
In this paper we introduce a new dynamical system which we call Angular billiard. It acts on the exterior points of a convex curve in Euclidean plane. In a neighborhood of the boundary curve this system turns out to be dual to the Birkhoff…
In an ordinary billiard trajectories of a Hamiltonian system are elastically reflected after a collision with a hypersurface (scatterer). If the scatterer is a submanifold of codimension more than one, we say that the billiard is…
In this paper we present new results regarding the periodicity of outer billiards in the hyperbolic plane around polygonal tables which are tiles in regular two-piece tilings of the hyperbolic plane.
We show that the complexity of the billiard in a typical polygon grows cubically and the number of saddle connections grows quadratically along certain subsequences. It is known that the set of points whose first n-bounces hits the same…
We explore the triangle outer billiards map in points at infinity in the hyperbolic plane, focusing on the rotation number. Building on Dogru and Tabachnikov's work, which established the conditions for triangles where the rotation number…
We consider the outer billiards map with contraction outside polygons. We construct a 1-parameter family of systems such that each system has an open set in which the dynamics is reduced to that of a piecewise contraction on the interval.…
Billiard systems, broadly speaking, may be regarded as models of mechanical systems in which rigid parts interact through elastic impulsive (collision) forces. When it is desired or necessary to account for linear/angular momentum exchange…
In an ordinary billiard system trajectories of a Hamiltonian system are elastically reflected after a collision with a hypersurface (scatterer). If the scatterer is a submanifold of codimension more than one, we say that the billiard is…
The configuration manifold $M$ of a mechanical system consisting of two unconstrained rigid bodies in $\mathbb{R}^n$, $n\geq 1$, is a manifold with boundary (typically with singularities.) A complete description of the system requires…
In this paper we define and study the billiard problem on bounded regions on surfaces of constant curvature. We show that this problem defines a 2-dimensional conservative and reversible dynamical system, defined by a Twist diffeomorphism,…
It is known that $C^1$-smooth strictly convex Radon norms in $\mathbb{R}^2$ can be characterized by the property that the outer billiard map, which corresponds to the unit ball of the norm, has an invariant curve consisting of 4-periodic…
There is an open set of right triangles such that for each irrational triangle in this set (i) periodic billiards orbits are dense in the phase space, (ii) there is a unique nonsingular perpendicular billiard orbit which is not periodic,…
This paper surveys our results on integrable billiards. We consider various models of billiards, including Birkhoff, outer, magnetic, and Minkowski billiards. Also, we discuss wire billiards and billiards in cones. For four models of convex…
In the class of projective billiards, which contains the usual billiards, we exhibit counter-examples to Ivrii's conjecture, which states that in any planar billiard with smooth boundary the set of periodic orbits has zero measure. The…
We consider systems of "pinned balls," i.e., balls that have fixed positions and pseudo-velocities. Pseudo-velocities change according to the same rules as those for velocities of totally elastic collisions between moving balls. The times…
We study outer billiards with contraction outside regular polygons. For regular $n$-gons with $n = 3, 4, 5, 6, 8$, and $12$, we show that as the contraction rate approaches $1$, dynamics of the system converges, in a certain sense, to that…
The bounce spectrum of a polygonal billiard table is the collection of all bi-infinite sequences of edge labels corresponding to billiard trajectories on the table. We give methods for reconstructing from the bounce spectrum of a polygonal…
Recent experiments have shown that many species of microorganisms leave a solid surface at a fixed angle determined by steric interactions and near-field hydrodynamics. This angle is completely independent of the incoming angle. For several…
We study non-Birkhoff periodic orbits in symmetric convex planar billiards. Our main result provides a quantitative criterion for the existence of such orbits with prescribed minimal period, rotation number, and spatiotemporal symmetry. We…