Switching chaos on/off in Duffing oscillator

Abstract

Periodic forcing of nonlinear oscillators generates a rich and complex variety of behaviors, ranging from regular to chaotic behavior. In this work we seek to control, i.e., either suppress or generate, the chaotic behavior of a classical reference example in books or introductory articles, the Duffing oscillator. For this purpose, we propose an elegant strategy consisting of simply adjusting the shape of the time-dependent forcing. The efficiency of the proposed strategy is shown analytically, numerically and experimentally. In addition due to its simplicity and low cost such a work could easily be turned into an excellent teaching tool.