Status of the differential transformation method

Further to a recent controversy on whether the differential transformation method (DTM) for solving a differential equation is purely and solely the traditional Taylor series method, it is emphasized that the DTM is currently used, often only, as a technique for (analytically) calculating the power series of the solution (in terms of the initial value parameters). Sometimes, a piecewise analytic continuation process is implemented either in a numerical routine (e.g., within a shooting method) or in a semi-analytical procedure (e.g., to solve a boundary value problem). Emphasized also is the fact that, at the time of its invention, the currently-used basic ingredients of the DTM (that transform a differential equation into a difference equation of same order that is iteratively solvable) were already known for a long time by the "traditional"-Taylor-method users (notably in the elaboration of software packages --numerical routines-- for automatically solving ordinary differential equations). At now, the defenders of the DTM still ignore the, though much better developed, studies of the "traditional"-Taylor-method users who, in turn, seem to ignore similarly the existence of the DTM. The DTM has been given an apparent strong formalization (set on the same footing as the Fourier, Laplace or Mellin transformations). Though often used trivially, it is easily attainable and easily adaptable to different kinds of differentiation procedures. That has made it very attractive. Hence applications to various problems of the Taylor method, and more generally of the power series method (including noninteger powers) has been sketched. It seems that its potential has not been exploited as it could be. After a discussion on the reasons of the "misunderstandings" which have caused the controversy, the preceding topics are concretely illustrated.Comment: To appear in Applied Mathematics and Computation, 29 pages, references and further considerations adde

An implicit algorithm for validated enclosures of the solutions to variational equations for ODEs

We propose a new algorithm for computing validated bounds for the solutions to the first order variational equations associated to ODEs. These validated solutions are the kernel of numerics computer-assisted proofs in dynamical systems literature. The method uses a high-order Taylor method as a predictor step and an implicit method based on the Hermite-Obreshkov interpolation as a corrector step. The proposed algorithm is an improvement of the $C^1$-Lohner algorithm proposed by Zgliczy\'nski and it provides sharper bounds. As an application of the algorithm, we give a computer-assisted proof of the existence of an attractor set in the R\"ossler system, and we show that the attractor contains an invariant and uniformly hyperbolic subset on which the dynamics is chaotic, that is, conjugated to subshift of finite type with positive topological entropy.Comment: 33 pages, 11 figure

Guaranteed Global Deterministic Optimization and Constraint Programming for Complex Dynamic Problems

International audienceIn this article we focus on particular multi-physics (mechanic, magnetic, electronic...) dynamic problems. These problems contain some differential constraints to model dynamic behaviors. The goal is to be able to solve it with guarantee, meaning to get a proof that all constraints are satisfied (without any approximation caused by binary representations or rounding modes from the unit core computing). The idea of getting guarantees on the arithmetic operations has been introduced via Interval Arithmetic. Computers become faster gradually, increasing the rate of operations number computable in one time unit. The results computed are often rounded to the nearest representable values, then the global errors are increasing gradually as well without any control over it

Lagrangian Reachabililty

We introduce LRT, a new Lagrangian-based ReachTube computation algorithm that conservatively approximates the set of reachable states of a nonlinear dynamical system. LRT makes use of the Cauchy-Green stretching factor (SF), which is derived from an over-approximation of the gradient of the solution flows. The SF measures the discrepancy between two states propagated by the system solution from two initial states lying in a well-defined region, thereby allowing LRT to compute a reachtube with a ball-overestimate in a metric where the computed enclosure is as tight as possible. To evaluate its performance, we implemented a prototype of LRT in C++/Matlab, and ran it on a set of well-established benchmarks. Our results show that LRT compares very favorably with respect to the CAPD and Flow* tools.Comment: Accepted to CAV 201

Splitting and composition methods in the numerical integration of differential equations

We provide a comprehensive survey of splitting and composition methods for the numerical integration of ordinary differential equations (ODEs). Splitting methods constitute an appropriate choice when the vector field associated with the ODE can be decomposed into several pieces and each of them is integrable. This class of integrators are explicit, simple to implement and preserve structural properties of the system. In consequence, they are specially useful in geometric numerical integration. In addition, the numerical solution obtained by splitting schemes can be seen as the exact solution to a perturbed system of ODEs possessing the same geometric properties as the original system. This backward error interpretation has direct implications for the qualitative behavior of the numerical solution as well as for the error propagation along time. Closely connected with splitting integrators are composition methods. We analyze the order conditions required by a method to achieve a given order and summarize the different families of schemes one can find in the literature. Finally, we illustrate the main features of splitting and composition methods on several numerical examples arising from applications.Comment: Review paper; 56 pages, 6 figures, 8 table