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Related papers: Periodic orbits in outer billiards

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We give lower bound on the number of periodic billiard trajectories inside a generic smooth strictly convex closed surface in 3-space: for odd n, there are at least 2(n-1) such trajectories. We apply a topological approach based on the…

Differential Geometry · Mathematics 2007-05-23 Michael Farber , Serge Tabachnikov

We show that there exists a $C^2$ open dense set of convex bodies with smooth boundary whose billiard map exhibits a non-trivial hyperbolic basic set. As a consequence billiards in generic convex bodies have positive topological entropy and…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2024-02-22 Mário Bessa , Gianluigi Del Magno , João Lopes Dias , José Pedro Gaivão , Maria Joana Torres

The classical inner and outer billiards can be formulated in variational terms, with length and area as the respective generating functions. The other two combinations, ``inner with area'' and ``outer with length,'' are more recently…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2025-10-15 Lael Edwards-Costa

We study dissipative polygonal outer billiards, i.e. outer billiards about convex polygons with a contractive reflection law. We prove that dissipative outer billiards about any triangle and the square are asymptotically periodic, i.e. they…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2013-10-18 Gianluigi Del Magno , José Pedro Gaivão , Eugene Gutkin

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…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2018-11-14 Misha Bialy , Andrey E. Mironov , Lior Shalom

We consider billiard trajectories in a smooth convex body in $\mathbb R^d$ and estimate the number of distinct periodic trajectories that make exactly $p$ reflections per period at the boundary of the body. In the case of prime $p$ we…

Algebraic Topology · Mathematics 2011-07-06 R. N. Karasev

In this text we study billiards on ovals and investigate some consequences of a rotational symmetry of the boundary on the dynamics. As it simplifies some calculations, the symmetry helps to obtain the results. We focus on periodic orbits…

We introduce symplectic billiards for pairs of possibly non-convex polygons. After establishing basic properties, we give several criteria on pairs of polygons for the symplectic billiard map to be fully periodic, i.e. $\textit{every}$…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2024-02-20 Peter Albers , Fabian Lander , Jannik M. Westermann

We consider the dual billiard map with respect to a smooth strictly convex closed hypersurface in linear 2m-dimensional symplectic space and prove that it has at least 2m distinct 3-periodic orbits.

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2014-10-01 Serge Tabachnikov

Mathematical billiards is much like the real game: a point mass, representing the ball, rolls in a straight line on a (perfectly friction-less) table, striking the sides according to the law of reflection. A billiard trajectory is then…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2024-10-28 Hongjia H. Chen , Hinke M. Osinga

We introduce a new class of billiard-like system, ``bouncing outer billiards" which are 3-dimensional cousins of outer billiards of Neumann and Moser. We prove that bouncing outer billiard on a smooth convex body has at least four…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2024-10-24 Andrey Gogolev , Levi Keck , Kevin Lewis

We show that for any natural number n, the set of domains containing absolutely periodic orbits of order n are dense in the set of bounded strictly convex domains with smooth boundary. The proof that such an orbit exists is an extension to…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2022-09-26 Keagan G. Callis

An approach due to Wojtkovski [9], based on the Jacobi fields, is applied to study sets of 3-period orbits in billiards on hyperbolic plane and on two-dimensional sphere. It is found that the set of 3-period orbits in billiards on…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2011-11-01 Victoria Blumen , Ki Yeun Kim , Joe Nance , Vadim Zharnitsky

Outer billiards is a simple dynamical system based on a convex planar shape. The Moser-Neumann question, first posed by B.H. Neumann around 1960, asks if there exists a planar shape for which outer billiards has an unbounded orbit. The…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2008-07-29 Richard Evan Schwartz

In this paper we establish a kind of bijection between the orbits of a polygonal outer billiards system and the orbits of a related (and simpler to analyze) system called the pinwheel map. One consequence of the result is that the outer…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2010-04-26 Richard Evan Schwartz

We study outer billiard systems around a class of circular sectors. For semi-discs, we prove the existence of elliptic islands occupying a positive proportion of the plane. Combined with known results, this shows the coexistence of…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2025-06-24 Zaicun Li

It is known that at lemon and moon billiards that have a sufficiently small curvature on one of their circular arcs are hyperbolic. In this paper we show that replacing this circular arc by a more general boundary component of small…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2026-03-03 Alexander Grigo

A general formula for the linearized Poincar\'e map of a billiard with a potential is derived. The stability of periodic orbits is given by the trace of a product of matrices describing the piecewise free motion between reflections and the…

chao-dyn · Physics 2008-02-03 Holger R. Dullin

I announce a solution of the conjecture about the measure of periodic points for planar billiard tables. The theorem says that if $\Om\subset\R^2$ is a compact domain with piecewise $C^3$ boundary, then the set of periodic orbits for the…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2007-05-23 Eugene Gutkin

Outer billiards is a basic dynamical system, defined relative to a planar convex shape. This system was introduced in the 1950's by B.H. Neumann and later popularized in the 1970's by J. Moser. All along, one of the central questions has…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2007-05-23 Richard Evan Schwartz