A Generalization of the Theory of Normal Forms

Abstract

Normal forms allow the use of a restricted class of coordinate transformations (typically homogeneous polynomials) to put the bifurcations found in nonlinear dynamical systems into a few standard forms. We investigate here the consequences of relaxing the restrictions of the form of the coordinate transformations. In the Duffing equation, a logarithmic transformation can remove the nonlinearity: in one interpretation, the nonlinearity is replaced by a branch cut leading to a Poincare section. When the linearized problem is autonomous with diagonal Jordan form, we can remove all nonlinearities order by order using these singular coordinate transformations.