"In this second edition extensive use is made of the computer algebra system, Maple® V. No prior knowledge of Maple® or of programming is assumed."
-Zentralblatt Math
"Correctly balances a good treatment of nonlinear, but also nonchaotic, behavior of systems with some of the exciting findings about chaotic dynamics... One of the book’s strengths is the diverse selection of examples from mechanical, chemical, electronic, fluid and many other systems... Another strength of the book is the diversity of approaches that the student is encouraged to take...the authors have chosen well and the trio of text, MAPLE-based software, and the lab manual gives the newcomer to nonlinear physics quite an effective set of tools...this text simultaneously serves as an excellent, structured introduction to MAPLE V...Basic ideas are explained clearly and illustrated with many examples."
-Physics Today (on the first edition)
"The care that the authors have taken to ensure that their text is as comprehensive, versatile, interactive, and student-friendly as possible place this book far above the average."
- Scientific Computing World
"An...excellent book...the authors have been able to cover an extraordinary range of topics and hopefully excite a wide audience to investigate nonlinear phenomena...accessible to advanced undergraduates and yet challenging enough for graduate students and working scientists....The reader is guided through it all with sound advice and humor....I hope that many will adopt the text."
- American Journal of Physics (on the first edition)
"Its organization of subject matter, clarity of writing, and smooth integration of analytic and computational techniques put it among the very best...Richard Enns and George McGuire have written an excellent text for introductory nonlinear physics."
- Computers in Physics (on the first edition)
I Theory.- 1 Introduction.- 1.1 It’s a Nonlinear World.- 1.2 Symbolic Computation.- 1.2.1 Examples of Maple Operations.- 1.2.2 Getting Maple Help.- 1.2.3 Use of Maple in Studying Nonlinear Physics.- 1.3 Nonlinear Experimental Activities.- 1.4 Scope of Part I (Theory).- 2 Nonlinear Systems. Part I.- 2.1 Nonlinear Mechanics.- 2.1.1 The Simple Pendulum.- 2.1.2 The Eardrum.- 2.1.3 Nonlinear Damping.- 2.1.4 Nonlinear Lattice Dynamics.- 2.2 Competition Phenomena.- 2.2.1 Volterra—Lotka Competition Equations.- 2.2.2 Population Dynamics of Fox Rabies in Europe.- 2.2.3 Selection and Evolution of Biological Molecules.- 2.2.4 Laser Beam Competition Equations.- 2.2.5 Rapoport’s Model for the Arms Race.- 2.3 Nonlinear Electrical Phenomena.- 2.3.1 Nonlinear Inductance.- 2.3.2 An Electronic Oscillator (the Van der Pol Equation).- 2.4 Chemical and Other Oscillators.- 2.4.1 Chemical Oscillators.- 2.4.2 The Beating Heart.- 3 Nonlinear Systems. Part II.- 3.1 Pattern Formation.- 3.1.1 Chemical Waves.- 3.1.2 Snowflakes and Other Fractal Structures.- 3.1.3 Rayleigh—Bénard Convection.- 3.1.4 Cellular Automata and the Game of Life.- 3.2 Solitons.- 3.2.1 Shallow Water Waves (KdV and Other Equations).- 3.2.2 Sine-Gordon Equation.- 3.2.3 Self-Induced Transparency.- 3.2.4 Optical Solitons.- 3.2.5 The Jovian Great Red Spot (GRS).- 3.2.6 The Davydov Soliton.- 3.3 Chaos and Maps.- 3.3.1 Forced Oscillators.- 3.3.2 Lorenz and Rössler Systems.- 3.3.3 Poincaré Sections and Maps.- 3.3.4 Examples of One- and Two-Dimensional Maps.- 4 Topological Analysis.- 4.1 Introductory Remarks.- 4.2 Types of Simple Singular Points.- 4.3 Classifying Simple Singular Points.- 4.3.1 Poincaré’s Theorem for the Vortex (Center).- 4.4 Examples of Phase Plane Analysis.- 4.4.1 The Simple Pendulum.- 4.4.2 The Laser Competition Equations.- 4.4.3 Example of a Higher Order Singularity.- 4.5 Bifurcations.- 4.6 Isoclines.- 4.7 3-Dimensional Nonlinear Systems.- 5 Analytic Methods.- 5.1 Introductory Remarks.- 5.2 Some Exact Methods.- 5.2.1 Separation of Variables.- 5.2.2 The Bernoulli Equation.- 5.2.3 The Riccati Equation.- 5.2.4 Equations of the Structure d2y/dx2 = f (y).- 5.3 Some Approximate Methods.- 5.3.1 Maple Generated Taylor Series Solution.- 5.3.2 The Perturbation Approach: Poisson’s Method.- 5.3.3 Lindstedt’s Method.- 5.4 The Krylov—Bogoliubov (KB) Method.- 5.5 Ritz and Galerkin Methods.- 6 The Numerical Approach.- 6.1 Finite-Difference Approximations.- 6.2 Euler and Modified Euler Methods.- 6.2.1 Euler Method.- 6.2.2 The Modified Euler Method.- 6.3 Rungé—Kutta (RK) Methods.- 6.3.1 The Basic Approach.- 6.3.2 Examples of Common RK Algorithms.- 6.4 Adaptive Step Size.- 6.4.1 A Simple Example.- 6.4.2 The Step Doubling Approach.- 6.4.3 The RKF 45 Algorithm.- 6.5 Stiff Equations.- 6.6 Implicit and Semi-Implicit Schemes.- 7 Limit Cycles.- 7.1 Stability Aspects.- 7.2 Relaxation Oscillations.- 7.3 Bendixson’s First Theorem.- 7.3.1 Bendixson’s Negative Criterion.- 7.3.2 Proof of Theorem.- 7.3.3 Applications.- 7.4 The Poincaré—Bendixson Theorem.- 7.4.1 Poincaré—Bendixson Theorem.- 7.4.2 Application of the Theorem.- 7.5 The Brusselator Model.- 7.5.1 Prigogine—Lefever (Brusselator) Model.- 7.5.2 Application of the Poincaré—Bendixson Theorem.- 7.6 3-Dimensional Limit Cycles.- 8 Forced Oscillators.- 8.1 Duffing’s Equation.- 8.1.1 The Harmonic Solution.- 8.1.2 The Nonlinear Response Curves.- 8.2 The Jump Phenomenon and Hysteresis.- 8.3 Subharmonic & Other Periodic Oscillations.- 8.4 Power Spectrum.- 8.5 Chaotic Oscillations.- 8.6 Entrainment and Quasiperiodicity.- 8.6.1 Entrainment.- 8.6.2 Quasiperiodicity.- 8.7 The Rössler and Lorenz Systems.- 8.7.1 The Rössler Attractor.- 8.7.2 The Lorenz Attractor.- 8.8 Hamiltonian Chaos.- 8.8.1 Hamiltonian Formulation of Classical Mechanics.- 8.8.2 The Hénon-Heiles Hamiltonian.- 9 Nonlinear Maps.- 9.1 Introductory Remarks.- 9.2 The Logistic Map.- 9.2.1 Introduction.- 9.2.2 Geometrical Representation.- 9.3 Fixed Points and Stability.- 9.4 The Period-Doubling Cascade to Chaos.- 9.5 Period Doubling in the Real World.- 9.6 The Lyapunov Exponent.- 9.7 Stretching and Folding.- 9.8 The Circle Map.- 9.9 Chaos versus Noise.- 9.10 2-Dimensional Maps.- 9.10.1 Introductory Remarks.- 9.10.2 Classification of Fixed Points.- 9.10.3 Delayed Logistic Map.- 9.10.4 Mandelbrot Map.- 9.11 Mandelbrot and Julia Sets.- 9.12 Nonconservative versus Conservative Maps.- 9.13 Controlling Chaos.- 9.14 3-Dimensional Maps: Saturn’s Rings.- 10 Nonlinear PDE Phenomena.- 10.1 Introductory Remarks.- 10.2 Burgers’ Equation.- 10.3 Bäcklund Transformations.- 10.3.1 The Basic Idea.- 10.3.2 Examples.- 10.3.3 Nonlinear Superposition.- 10.4 Solitary Waves.- 10.4.1 The Basic Approach.- 10.4.2 Phase Plane Analysis.- 10.4.3 KdV Equation.- 10.4.4 Sine-Gordon Equation.- 10.4.5 The Three-Wave Problem.- 11 Numerical Simulation.- 11.1 Finite Difference Approximations.- 11.2 Explicit Methods.- 11.2.1 Diffusion Equation.- 11.2.2 Fisher’s Nonlinear Diffusion Equation.- 11.2.3 Klein—Gordon Equation.- 11.2.4 KdV Solitary Wave Collisions.- 11.3 Von Neumann Stability Analysis.- 11.3.1 Linear Diffusion Equation.- 11.3.2 Burgers’ Equation.- 11.4 Implicit Methods.- 11.5 Method of Characteristics.- 11.5.1 Colliding Laser Beams.- 11.5.2 General Equation.- 11.5.3 Sine-Gordon Equation.- 11.6 Higher Dimensions.- 12 Inverse Scattering Method.- 12.1 Lax’s Formulation.- 12.2 Application to KdV Equation.- 12.2.1 Direct Problem.- 12.2.2 Time Evolution of the Scattering Data.- 12.2.3 The Inverse Problem.- 12.3 Multi-Soliton Solutions.- 12.4 General Input Shapes.- 12.5 The Zakharov-Shabat/AKNS Approach.- II Experimental Activities.- to Nonlinear Experiments.- 1 Spin Toy Pendulum.- 2 Driven Eardrum.- 3 Nonlinear Damping.- 4 Anharmonic Potential.- 5 Iron Core Inductor.- 6 Nonlinear LRC Circuit.- 7 Tunnel Diode Negative Resistance Curve.- 8 Tunnel Diode Self-Excited Oscillator.- 9 Forced Duffing Equation.- 10 Focal Point Instability.- 11 Compound Pendulum.- 12 Stable Limit Cycle.- 13 Van der Pol Limit Cycle.- 14 Relaxation Oscillations: Neon Bulb.- 15 Relaxation Oscillations: Drinking Bird.- 16 Relaxation Oscillations: Tunnel Diode.- 17 Hard Spring.- 18 Nonlinear Resonance Curve: Mechanical.- 19 Nonlinear Resonance Curve: Electrical.- 20 Nonlinear Resonance Curve: Magnetic.- 21 Subharmonic Response: Period Doubling.- 22 Diode: Period Doubling.- 23 Five-Well Magnetic Potential.- 24 Power Spectrum.- 25 Entrainment and Quasiperiodicity.- 26 Quasiperiodicity.- 27 Chua’s Butterfly.- 28 Route to Chaos.- 29 Driven Spin Toy.- 30 Mapping.