Objectives

It is proposed to carry out an interdisciplinary research project

(i) to investigate the effect of noise on the dynamics of multistable chaotic systems,

(ii) to analyse the problem of control in such systems and

(iii) to exploit the results of the fundamental research by applying them to the analysis of dynamics of nonlinear optical devices and of cardiavascular flow.

The specific objectives of the project are to solve the following fundamental and applied problems:

T1. Noise-induced escape and the energy-optimal control of switching from the basin of attraction of a non-hyperbolic attractor with fractal boundaries;

T2. Fluctuational escape from a quasi-hyperbolic attractor and in a two-dimensional reversible map;

T3. Noise-Noise-induced escape in the presence of transient chaos;

T4. Changes in the stochastic dynamics of multistable systems caused by bifurcations arising under a variation of system parameters, and the development of a new strategy for the control of complexity;

T5. The influence of external noise on systems of coupled oscillators.

T6. Multistability and fluctuational transitions in semiconductor lasers with periodically driven pumping current, or with incoherent optical feedback in the presence of fluctuations.

T7. Modelling the stochastic nonlinear dynamics of cardiovascular flow. The results will be compared with time-series analyses of blood-flow obtained for two groups of healthy subjects and for patients with differing severities of heart failure.