Symmetry in systems with gyroscopic forces

Abstract

We consider a generalization of the notion of a natural mechanical system to the case of additional forces of gyroscopic type. Such forces appear, for example, as a result of global reduction of a natural system with symmetry. We study symmetries in the systems with gyroscopic forces to find out when these systems admit a global analogue of a cyclic integral. The results are applied to the problem of the motion of a rigid body about a fixed point in potential and gyroscopic forces to find the most general form of such forces admitting the global area type integral.