Periodic orbits close to elliptic tori and applications to the three-body problem

We prove, under suitable non-resonance and non-degeneracy ``twist'' conditions, a Birkhoff-Lewis type result showing the existence of infinitely many periodic solutions, with larger and larger minimal period, accumulating onto elliptic invariant tori (of Hamiltonian systems). We prove the applicability of this result to the spatial planetary three-body problem in the small eccentricity-inclination regime. Furthermore, we find other periodic orbits under some restrictions on the period and the masses of the ``planets''. The proofs are based on averaging theory, KAM theory and variational methods. (Supported by M.U.R.S.T. Variational Methods and Nonlinear Differential Equations.

Stability Properties of the Riemann Ellipsoids

We study the ellipticity and the ``Nekhoroshev stability'' (stability properties for finite, but very long, time scales) of the Riemann ellipsoids. We provide numerical evidence that the regions of ellipticity of the ellipsoids of types II and III are larger than those found by Chandrasekhar in the 60's and that all Riemann ellipsoids, except a finite number of codimension one subfamilies, are Nekhoroshev--stable. We base our analysis on a Hamiltonian formulation of the problem on a covering space, using recent results from Hamiltonian perturbation theory.Comment: 29 pages, 6 figure

GCD matrices, posets, and nonintersecting paths

We show that with any finite partially ordered set one can associate a matrix whose determinant factors nicely. As corollaries, we obtain a number of results in the literature about GCD matrices and their relatives. Our main theorem is proved combinatorially using nonintersecting paths in a directed graph.Comment: 10 pages, see related papers at http://www.math.msu.edu/~saga