Time-independent approximations for periodically driven systems with friction

Abstract

The classical dynamics of a particle that is driven by a rapidly oscillating potential (with frequency $\omega$) is studied. The motion is separated into a slow part and a fast part that oscillates around the slow part. The motion of the slow part is found to be described by a time-independent equation that is derived as an expansion in orders of $\omega^{-1}$ (in this paper terms to the order $\omega^{-3}$ are calculated explicitly). This time-independent equation is used to calculate the attracting fixed points and their basins of attraction. The results are found to be in excellent agreement with numerical solutions of the original time-dependent problem.