Effect of 1:3 resonance on the steady-state dynamics of a forced strongly nonlinear oscillator with a linear light attachment

We study the 1:3 resonant dynamics of a two degree-of-freedom (DOF) dissipative forced strongly nonlinear system by first examining the periodic steady-state solutions of the underlying Hamiltonian system and then the forced and damped configuration. Specifically, we analyze the steady periodic responses of the two DOF system consisting of a grounded strongly nonlinear oscillator with harmonic excitation coupled to a light linear attachment under condition of 1:3 resonance. This system is particularly interesting since it possesses two basic linearized eigenfrequencies in the ratio 3:1, which, under condition of resonance, causes the localization of the fundamental and third-harmonic components of the responses of the grounded nonlinear oscillator and the light linear attachment, respectively. We examine in detail the topological structure of the periodic responses in the frequency–energy domain by computing forced frequency–energy plots (FEPs) in order to deduce the effects of the 1:3 resonance. We perform complexification/averaging analysis and develop analytical approximations for strongly nonlinear steady-state responses, which agree well with direct numerical simulations. In addition, we investigate the effect of the forcing on the 1:3 resonance phenomena and conclude our study with the stability analysis of the steady-state solutions around 1:3 internal resonance, and a discussion of the practical applications of our findings in the area of nonlinear targeted energy transfer.     

Nonlinear damping in a micromechanical oscillator

Nonlinear elastic effects play an important role in the dynamics of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS). A Duffing oscillator is widely used as an archetypical model of mechanical resonators with nonlinear elastic behavior. In contrast, nonlinear dissipation effects in micromechanical oscillators are often overlooked. In this work, we consider a doubly clamped micromechanical beam oscillator, which exhibits nonlinearity in both elastic and dissipative properties. The dynamics of the oscillator is measured in both frequency and time domains and compared to theoretical predictions based on a Duffing-like model with nonlinear dissipation. We especially focus on the behavior of the system near bifurcation points. The results show that nonlinear dissipation can have a significant impact on the dynamics of micromechanical systems. To account for the results, we have developed a continuous model of a geometrically nonlinear beam-string with a linear Voigt–Kelvin viscoelastic constitutive law, which shows a relation between linear and nonlinear damping. However, the experimental results suggest that this model alone cannot fully account for all the experimentally observed nonlinear dissipation, and that additional nonlinear dissipative processes exist in our devices.     

Relaxation oscillations,subharmonic orbits and chaos in the dynamics of a linear lattice with a local essentially nonlinear attachment

We study the dynamic interactions between traveling waves propagating in a linear lattice and a lightweight, essentially nonlinear and damped local attachment. Correct to leading order, we reduce the dynamics to a strongly nonlinear damped oscillator forced by two harmonic terms. One of the excitation frequencies is characteristic of the traveling wave that impedes to the attachment, whereas the other accounts for local lattice dynamics. These two frequencies are energy-independent; a third energy-dependent frequency is present in the problem, characterizing the nonlinear oscillation of the attachment when forced by the traveling wave. We study this three-frequency strongly nonlinear problem through slow-fast partitions of the dynamics and resort to action-angle coordinates and Melnikov analysis. For damping below a critical threshold, we prove the existence of relaxation oscillations of the attachment; these oscillations are associated with enhanced targeted energy transfer from the traveling wave to the attachment. Moreover, in the limit of weak or no damping, we prove the existence of subharmonic oscillations of arbitrarily large periods, and of chaotic motions. The analytical results are supported by numerical simulations of the reduced order model.     

A time-domain nonlinear system identification method based on multiscale dynamic partitions

Based on a theoretical foundation for empirical mode decomposition, which dictates the correspondence between the analytical and empirical slow-flow analyses, we develop a time-domain nonlinear system identification (NSI) technique. This NSI method is based on multiscale dynamic partitions and direct analysis of measured time series, and makes no presumptions regarding the type and strength of the system nonlinearity. Hence, the method is expected to be applicable to broad classes of applications involving time-variant/time-invariant, linear/nonlinear, and smooth/non-smooth dynamical systems. The method leads to nonparametric reduced order models of simple form; i.e., in the form of coupled or uncoupled oscillators with time-varying or time-invariant coefficients forced by nonhomogeneous terms representing nonlinear modal interactions. Key to our method is a slow/fast partition of transient dynamics which leads to the identification of the basic fast frequencies of the dynamics, and the subsequent development of slow-flow models governing the essential dynamics of the system. We provide examples of application of the NSI method by analyzing strongly nonlinear modal interactions in two dynamical systems with essentially nonlinear attachments.     

Weakly coupled parametrically forced oscillator networks: existence,stability, and symmetry of solutions

In this paper, we discuss existence, stability, and symmetry of solutions for networks of parametrically forced oscillators. We consider a nonlinear oscillator model with strong 2:1 resonance via parametric excitation. For uncoupled systems, the 2:1 resonance property results in sets of solutions that we classify using a combinatorial approach. The symmetry properties for solution sets are presented as are the group operators that generate the isotropy subgroups. We then impose weak coupling and prove that solutions from the uncoupled case persist for small coupling by using an appropriate Poincaré map and the Implicit Function Theorem. Solution bifurcations are investigated as a function of coupling strength and forcing frequency using numerical continuation techniques. We find that the characteristics of the single oscillator system are transferred to the network under weak coupling. We explore interesting dynamics that emerge with larger coupling strength, including anti-synchronized chaos and unsynchronized chaos. A classification for the symmetry-breaking that occurs due to weak coupling is presented for a simple example network.     

How to compute invariant manifolds and their reduced dynamics in high-dimensional finite element models

Invariant manifolds are important constructs for the quantitative and qualitative understanding of nonlinear phenomena in dynamical systems. In nonlinear damped mechanical systems, for instance, spectral submanifolds have emerged as useful tools for the computation of forced response curves, backbone curves, detached resonance curves (isolas) via exact reduced-order models. For conservative nonlinear mechanical systems, Lyapunov subcenter manifolds and their reduced dynamics provide a way to identify nonlinear amplitude–frequency relationships in the form of conservative backbone curves. Despite these powerful predictions offered by invariant manifolds, their use has largely been limited to low-dimensional academic examples. This is because several challenges render their computation unfeasible for realistic engineering structures described by finite element models. In this work, we address these computational challenges and develop methods for computing invariant manifolds and their reduced dynamics in very high-dimensional nonlinear systems arising from spatial discretization of the governing partial differential equations. We illustrate our computational algorithms on finite element models of mechanical structures that range from a simple beam containing tens of degrees of freedom to an aircraft wing containing more than a hundred–thousand degrees of freedom.

     

Steady-State dynamics of a linear structure weakly coupled to an essentially nonlinear oscillator

We present a theoretical study of the dynamics of the coupled system of Jiang, McFarland, Bergman, and Vakakis. It comprises a harmonically excited linear subsystem weakly coupled to an essentially nonlinear oscillator. We explored the rich dynamics exhibited by this coupled system by determining its periodic responses and their bifurcations. Not surprisingly, we found a lot of interesting dynamics over a broad frequency range: cyclic-fold, Hopf, symmetry-breaking, and period-doubling bifurcations; phase-locked motions; regions with multiple coexisting solutions; hysteresis; and chaos. We did not find any occurrence of energy transfer via modulation (also known as zero-to-one internal resonance); theoretically, the possibility of its occurrence was ruled out for systems with weak nonlinearity and damping. Finally, we investigated the ef fectiveness of the so-called nonlinear energy sink (NES) in vibration attenuation of forced linear structures. We found that the NES results in an increase in the vibration amplitude of the linear subsystem, especially when the damping is low, contrary to the claim made by Jiang et al. Also, we did not find any indication of nonlinear energy pumping or localization of energy in the NES, away from the directly forced linear subsystem, indicating that the NES is not ef fective for controlling the vibrations of forced linear structures.     

The Vadasz–Olek Model Regarded as a System of Coupled Oscillators

The Vadasz–Olek model of chaotic convection in a porous layer is revisited in this article. The first-order differential equations of this Lorenz-type model are transformed in the governing equations of a damped nonlinear oscillator, modulated by a linear degenerated overdamped oscillator (relaxator) which in turn is coupled to former one by a nonlinear cross force. The benefit of this mechanical analogy is an intuitive picture of the regular and chaotic dynamics described by the Vadasz–Olek model. Thus, there turns out that the “eyes” of the chaotic attractor correspond to the minima of the potential energy of the modulated nonlinear oscillator having a double-well shape. Several new aspects of the subcritical and supercritical dynamic regimes are discussed in some detail.     

Forced Oscillations of a System,Containing a Snap-Through Truss,Close to Its Equilibrium Position

The nonlinear dynamics of a two-degree-of-freedom mechanical system is considered. This system consists of a linear oscillator under the action of a time-periodic force and a snap-through truss, which acts as an absorber of the forced oscillations of the linear main system. The forced oscillations of the snap-through truss close to its equilibrium position are analyzed by the multiple scales method.     

Non-Filippov dynamics arising from the smoothing of nonsmooth systems,and its robustness to noise

Switch-like behaviour in dynamical systems may be modelled by highly nonlinear functions, such as Hill functions or sigmoid functions, or alternatively by piecewise-smooth functions, such as step functions. Consistent modelling requires that piecewise-smooth and smooth dynamical systems have similar dynamics, but the conditions for such similarity are not well understood. Here we show that by smoothing out a piecewise-smooth system one may obtain dynamics that is inconsistent with the accepted wisdom — so-called Filippov dynamics — at a discontinuity, even in the piecewise-smooth limit. By subjecting the system to white noise, we show that these discrepancies can be understood in terms of potential wells that allow solutions to dwell at the discontinuity for long times. Moreover we show that spurious dynamics will revert to Filippov dynamics, with a small degree of stochasticity, when the noise magnitude is sufficiently large compared to the order of smoothing. We apply the results to a model of a dry-friction oscillator, where spurious dynamics (inconsistent with Filippov’s convention or with Coulomb’s model of friction) can account for different coefficients of static and kinetic friction, but under sufficient noise the system reverts to dynamics consistent with Filippov’s convention (and with Coulomb-like friction).     

Fast data-driven model reduction for nonlinear dynamical systems

We present a fast method for nonlinear data-driven model reduction of dynamical systems onto their slowest nonresonant spectral submanifolds (SSMs). While the recently proposed reduced-order modeling method SSMLearn uses implicit optimization to fit a spectral submanifold to data and reduce the dynamics to a normal form, here, we reformulate these tasks as explicit problems under certain simplifying assumptions. In addition, we provide a novel method for timelag selection when delay-embedding signals from multimodal systems. We show that our alternative approach to data-driven SSM construction yields accurate and sparse rigorous models for essentially nonlinear (or non-linearizable) dynamics on both numerical and experimental datasets. Aside from a major reduction in complexity, our new method allows an increase in the training data dimensionality by several orders of magnitude. This promises to extend data-driven, SSM-based modeling to problems with hundreds of thousands of degrees of freedom.

     

Experimental study of regular and chaotic transients in a non-smooth system

This paper focuses on thoroughly exploring the finite-time transient behaviors occurring in a periodically driven non-smooth dynamical system. Prior to settling down into a long-term behavior, such as a periodic forced oscillation, or a chaotic attractor, responses may exhibit a variety of transient behaviors involving regular dynamics, co-existing attractors, and super-persistent chaotic transients. A simple and fundamental impacting mechanical system is used to demonstrate generic transient behavior in an experimental setting for a single degree of freedom non-smooth mechanical oscillator. Specifically, we consider a horizontally driven rigid-arm pendulum system that impacts an inclined rigid barrier. The forcing frequency of the horizontal oscillations is used as a bifurcation parameter. An important feature of this study is the systematic generation of generic experimental initial conditions, allowing a more thorough investigation of basins of attraction when multiple attractors are present. This approach also yields a perspective on some sensitive features associated with grazing bifurcations. In particular, super-persistent chaotic transients lasting much longer than the conventional settling time (associated with linear viscous damping) are characterized and distinguished from regular dynamics for the first time in an experimental mechanical system.     

Adaptive computation of aeroacoustic sources for a rudimentary landing gear

We present our simulation results for the benchmark problem of the flow past a rudimentary landing gear using a General Galerkin FEM, also referred to as adaptive DNS/LES. In General Galerkin, no explicit subgrid model is used; instead, the computational mesh is adaptively refined with respect to an a posteriori error estimate of a quantity of interest in the computation, in this case, the drag force on the rudimentary landing gear. Turbulent boundary layers are modeled using a simple wall‐layer model with the shear stress at walls proportional to the skin friction, which here is assumed to be small and, therefore, can be approximated by zero skin friction. We compare our results with experimental data and other state of the art computations, where we find good agreement in sound pressure levels, surface velocities, and flow separation. We also compare with detailed surface pressure experimental data where we find largely good agreement, apart from some local differences for which we discuss possible explanations. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Energy Transfers in a System of Two Coupled Oscillators with Essential Nonlinearity: 1:1 Resonance Manifold and Transient Bridging Orbits

The purpose of this study is to highlight and explain the vigorous energy transfers that may take place in a linear oscillator weakly coupled to an essentially nonlinear attachment, termed a nonlinear energy sink. Although these energy exchanges are encountered during the transient dynamics of the damped system, it is shown that the dynamics can be interpreted mainly in terms of the periodic orbits of the underlying Hamiltonian system. To this end, a frequency-energy plot gathering the periodic orbits of the system is constructed which demonstrates that, thanks to a 1:1 resonance capture, energy can be irreversibly and almost completely transferred from the linear oscillator to the nonlinear attachment. Furthermore, it is observed that this nonlinear energy pumping is triggered by the excitation of transient bridging orbits compatible with the nonlinear attachment being initially at rest, a common feature in most practical applications. A parametric study of the energy exchanges is also performed to understand the influence of the parameters of the nonlinear energy sink. Finally, the results of experimental measurements supporting the theoretical developments are discussed. This study was carried out while the author was a postdoctoral fellow at the National Technical University of Athens and at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.     

Averaging Oscillations with Small Fractional Damping and Delayed Terms

We demonstrate the method of averaging for conservative oscillators which may be strongly nonlinear, under small perturbations including delayed and/or fractional derivative terms. The unperturbed systems studied here include a harmonic oscillator, a strongly nonlinear oscillator with a cubic nonlinearity, as well as one with a nonanalytic nonlinearity. For the latter two cases, we use an approximate realization of the asymptotic method of averaging, based on harmonic balance. The averaged dynamics closely match the full numerical solutions in all cases, verifying the validity of the averaging procedure as well as the harmonic balance approximations therein. Moreover, interesting dynamics is uncovered in the strongly nonlinear case with small delayed terms, where arbitrarily many stable and unstable limit cycles can coexist, and infinitely many simultaneous saddle-node bifurcations can occur.     

Averaging Oscillations with Small Fractional Damping and Delayed Terms

We demonstrate the method of averaging for conservative oscillators which may be strongly nonlinear, under small perturbations including delayed and/or fractional derivative terms. The unperturbed systems studied here include a harmonic oscillator, a strongly nonlinear oscillator with a cubic nonlinearity, as well as one with a nonanalytic nonlinearity. For the latter two cases, we use an approximate realization of the asymptotic method of averaging, based on harmonic balance. The averaged dynamics closely match the full numerical solutions in all cases, verifying the validity of the averaging procedure as well as the harmonic balance approximations therein. Moreover, interesting dynamics is uncovered in the strongly nonlinear case with small delayed terms, where arbitrarily many stable and unstable limit cycles can coexist, and infinitely many simultaneous saddle-node bifurcations can occur.     

Nonlinear Dynamics of a Beam on Elastic Foundation

The nonlinear dynamics of a simply supported beam resting on a nonlinear spring bed with cubic stiffness is analyzed. The continuous differential operator describing the mathematical model of the system is discretized through the classical Galerkin procedure and its nonlinear dynamic behavior is investigated using the method of Normal Forms. This model can be regarded as a simple system describing the oscillations of flexural structures vibrating on nonlinear supports and then it can be considered as a simple investigation for the analysis of more complex systems of the same type. Indeed, the possibility of the model to exhibit actually interesting nonlinear phenomena (primary, superharmonic, subharmonic and internal resonances) has been shown in a range of feasibility of the physical parameters. The singular perturbation approach is used to study both the free and the forced oscillations; specifically two parameter families of stationary solutions are obtained for the forced oscillations.     

Transition to chaos and escape phenomenon in two-degrees-of-freedom oscillator with a kinematic excitation

We study the dynamics of a two-degrees-of-freedom (two-DOF) nonlinear oscillator representing a quarter-car model excited by a road roughness profile. Modeling the road profile by means of a harmonic function, we derive the Melnikov criterion for a system transition to chaos or escape. The analytically obtained estimations are confirmed by numerical simulations. To analyze the transient vibrations, we used recurrences.