Intramolecular dynamics bifurcations

Intramolecular dynamics and chemical reactions have been studied for a long time in terms of classical models. However, many of the early studies were restricted by the complexities resulting from classical chaos, Tlie application of the new dynamical systems theory to classical models of reactions has very recently revealed the existence of general bifurcation scenarios at the origin of chaos. Moreover, it can be shown that the infinite number of classical periodic orbits characteristic of chaos are topological combinations of a finite number of fundamental periodic orbits as determined by a symbolic dynamics. These properties appear to be very general and characteristic of typical classical reaction dynamics. 

See, for example, the following and references contained therein E. L. Sibert 111, W. P. Reinhardt, and J. T. Hynes, /. Chem. Phys., 81, 1115 (1984). Intramolecular Vibrational Relaxation and Spectra of CH and CD Overtones in Benzene and Perdeuterobenzene. S. P. Neshyba and N. De Leon,. Chem. Phys., 86, 6295 (1987). Qassical Resonances, Fermi Resonances, and Canonical Transformations for Three Nonlinearly Coupled Oscillators. S. P. Neshyba and N. De Leon,. Chem. Phys., 91, 7772 (1989). Projection Operator Formalism for the Characterization of Molecular Eigenstates Application to a 3 4 R nant System. G. S. Ezra, ]. Chem. Phys., 104, 26 (1996). Periodic Orbit Analysis of Molecular Vibrational Spectra Spectral Patterns and Dynamical Bifurcations in Fermi Resonant Systems. Also see Ref. 6. 

Recent results show that even after the annihilation of periodic orbits at a bifurcation there remain traces of the annihilated periodic orbits in the quantum amplitudes [50]. These so-called ghost periodic orbits have been interpreted in terms of the complex periodic orbits created when the corresponding real periodic orbits are annihilated. Such phenomena have been experimentally observed for Rydberg atoms in a magnetic field [11,51]. We shall show below that such phenomena are also important in intramolecular and dissociation dynamics. 

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