The geometry of the Wigner caustic and a decomposition of a curve into parallel arcs

In this paper we study global properties of the Wigner caustic of parameterized closed planar curves. We find new results on its geometry and singular points. In particular, we consider the Wigner caustic of rosettes, i.e. regular closed parameterized curves with non-vanishing curvature. We present a decomposition of a curve into parallel arcs to describe smooth branches of the Wigner caustic. By this construction we can find the number of smooth branches, the rotation number, the number of inflexion points and the parity of the number of cusp singularities of each branch. We also study the global properties of the Wigner caustic on shell (the branch of the Wigner caustic connecting two inflexion points of a curve). We apply our results to whorls—the important object to study the dynamics of a quantum particle in the optical lattice potential.

Symplectic invariants for parabolic orbits and cusp singularities of integrable systems

We discuss normal forms and symplectic invariants of parabolic orbits and cuspidal tori in integrable Hamiltonian systems with two degrees of freedom. Such singularities appear in many integrable systems in geometry and mathematical physics and can be considered as the simplest example of degenerate singularities. We also suggest some new techniques which apparently can be used for studying symplectic invariants of degenerate singularities of more general type. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Finite dimensional integrable systems: new trends and methods’.