Nonlinear Dynamics In Geosciences

This work comprises the proceedings of a conference held last year in Rhodes, Greece, to assess developments during the last 20 years in the field of nonlinear dynamics in geosciences. The volume has its own authority as part of the Aegean Conferences cycle, but it also brings together the most up-to-date research from the atmospheric sciences, hydrology, geology, and other areas of geosciences, and discusses the advances made and the future directions of nonlinear dynamics.

Advances in Nonlinear Geosciences is a set of contributions from the participants of “30 Years of Nonlinear Dynamics” held July 3-8, 2016 in Rhodes, Greece as part of the Aegean Conferences, as well as from several other experts in the field who could not attend the meeting. The volume brings together up-to-date research from the atmospheric sciences, hydrology, geology, and other areas of geosciences and presents the new advances made in the last 10 years. Topics include chaos synchronization, topological data analysis, new insights on fractals, multifractals and stochasticity, climate dynamics, extreme events, complexity, and causality, among other topics.

This work comprises the proceedings of a conference held last year in Rhodes, Greece, to assess developments during the last 20 years in the field of nonlinear dynamics in geosciences. The volume has its own authority as part of the Aegean Conferences cycle, but it also brings together the most up-to-date research from the atmospheric sciences, hydrology, geology, and other areas of geosciences, and discusses the advances made and the future directions of nonlinear dynamics.

Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Study Institute, Crete, Greece, July 14-24, 1985

Chaotic dynamic systems and non-linear processes, together with the resulting fractals and multifractals, are fundamental for analyzing data and understanding processes in the Earth and Environmental Sciences. Many processes and phenomena, poorly recognized only a few years ago, now can be studied and understood with the help of conceptual models from the fields of fractals and dynamics systems. This represents a bold step towards understanding how planet Earth works. The twenty-one papers presented in this volume reflect the state of fundamental and applied research on fractals and dynamic systems in Geoscience, from magma dynamics to geomorphology, from seismology to space science. The volume is of interest to scientists using fractals, multifractals, non-linear dynamics and chaos theory for analyzing complex datasets, as those arising from geological and geophysical processes. Postgraduate students and students in various fields of geoscience as well as physics and applied mathematics will also find the book to be a valuable resource for a clear view of the leading-edge research on fractals and dynamic systems in Geoscience.

Non-Linear Dynamics in Geophysics Jacques Dubois Although initiated in the 1960s by the studies of Richardson and Mandelbrot, the study of natural phenomena using the mathematical tools employed for the understanding of ‘chaos’ is comparatively recent. Indeed the field of applications for such techniques is very large because many natural phenomena exhibit chaotic dynamics. In Non-Linear Dynamics in Geophysics, Jacques Dubois presents a new approach to the study of complex, time-dependent natural systems, which are of considerable importance for understanding the solid Earth. He discusses the results of more than ten years’ of studies into the applications of non-linear dynamics theory to a wide range of geophysical systems in areas such as geomorphology, vulcanology, seismology, geomagnetism and natural hazard assessment. The book is divided into four parts, and represents the state-of-the-art in this discipline. The first part is devoted to general theoretical notions and tools: measures, dimensions, fractal sets, dynamic systems, limit cycles and attractors, multi-fractals and wavelet transforms. It is here that the notion of chaos is introduced, and where paths to chaos and chaos control are discussed. Part two describes the applications of these powerful techniques to geophysics: geomorphology, fragmentation, tectonics, seismicity, volcanic eruptions, seismic forecasting algorithms, and geomagnetism. The third part aims at a synthesis and a list of the perspectives offered by this approach. The book concludes with a few traditional illustrations of non-linear dynamics and several theoretical appendices. Readership: Final year undergraduate and postgraduate students of geology, geophysics and the Earth sciences, and scientists studying in these and related areas such as tectonics, seismology and geomagnetism. Industrial experts working on natural hazard and risk assessment, namely fracturing of rocks, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions and self-organised criticality applied to natural catastrophes. Mathematicians and mathematical physicists interested in applications of non-linear dynamics theory.

The enormous progress over the last decades in our understanding of the mechanisms behind the complex system “Earth” is to a large extent based on the availability of enlarged data sets and sophisticated methods for their analysis. Univariate as well as multivariate time series are a particular class of such data which are of special importance for studying the dynamical p- cesses in complex systems. Time series analysis theory and applications in geo- and astrophysics have always been mutually stimulating, starting with classical (linear) problems like the proper estimation of power spectra, which hasbeenputforwardbyUdnyYule(studyingthefeaturesofsunspotactivity) and, later, by John Tukey. In the second half of the 20th century, more and more evidence has been accumulated that most processes in nature are intrinsically non-linear and thus cannot be su?ciently studied by linear statistical methods. With mat- matical developments in the ?elds of dynamic system’s theory, exempli?ed by Edward Lorenz’s pioneering work, and fractal theory, starting with the early fractal concepts inferred by Harold Edwin Hurst from the analysis of geoph- ical time series,nonlinear methods became available for time seriesanalysis as well. Over the last decades, these methods have attracted an increasing int- est in various branches of the earth sciences. The world’s leading associations of geoscientists, the American Geophysical Union (AGU) and the European Geosciences Union (EGU) have reacted to these trends with the formation of special nonlinear focus groups and topical sections, which are actively present at the corresponding annual assemblies.