Homoclinic Tangles, Phase Locking, and Chaos in a Two-Frequency Perturbation of Duffing's Equation

Summary.

We study a two-frequency perturbation of Duffing's equation. When the perturbation is small, this system has a normally hyperbolic invariant torus which may be subjected to phase locking. Applying a version of Melnikov's method for multifrequency systems, we detect the occurrence of transverse intersection between the stable and unstable manifolds of the invariant torus. We show that if the invariant torus is not subjected to phase locking, then such a transverse intersection yields chaotic dynamics. When the invariant torus is subjected to phase locking, the situation is different. In this case, there exist two periodic orbits which are created in a saddle-node bifurcation. Using another version of Melnikov's method for slowly varying oscillators, we also give conditions under which the stable and unstable manifolds of the periodic orbits intersect transversely and hence chaotic dynamics may occur. Our results reveal that when the invariant torus is subjected to phase locking, chaotic dynamics resulting from transverse intersection between its stable and unstable manifolds may be interrupted.