Hyperbolic periodic orbits in nongradient systems and small-noise-induced metastable transitions

Abstract In the study of Hamiltonian systems on cotangent bundles, it is natural to perturb Hamiltonians by adding potentials (functions depending only on the base point). This led to the definition of Mañé genericity [ 8]: a property is generic if, given a Hamiltonian $H$, the set of potentials $g$ such that $H+g$ satisfies the property is generic. This notion is mostly used in the context of Hamiltonians that are convex in $p$, in the sense that $\partial ^2_{pp} H$ is positive definite at each point. We will also restrict our study to this situation. There is a close relation between perturbations of Hamiltonians by a small additive potential and perturbations by a positive factor close to one. Indeed, the Hamiltonians $H+g$ and $H/(1-g)$ have the same level one energy surface, hence their dynamics on this energy surface are reparametrisation of each other, this is the Maupertuis principle. This remark is particularly relevant when $H$ is homogeneous in the fibers (which corresponds to Finsler metrics) or even fiberwise quadratic (which corresponds to Riemannian metrics). In these cases, perturbations by potentials of the Hamiltonian correspond, up to parametrisation, to conformal perturbations of the metric. One of the widely studied aspects is to understand to what extent the return map associated to a periodic orbit can be modified by a small perturbation. This kind of question depends strongly on the context in which they are posed. Some of the most studied contexts are, in increasing order of difficulty, perturbations of general vector fields, perturbations of Hamiltonian systems inside the class of Hamiltonian systems, perturbations of Riemannian metrics inside the class of Riemannian metrics, and Mañé perturbations of convex Hamiltonians. It is for example well known that each vector field can be perturbed to a vector field with only hyperbolic periodic orbits, this is part of the Kupka–Smale Theorem, see [ 5, 13] (the other part of the Kupka–Smale Theorem states that the stable and unstable manifolds intersect transversally; it has also been studied in the various settings mentioned above but will not be discussed here). In the context of Hamiltonian vector fields, the statement has to be weakened, but it remains true that each Hamiltonian can be perturbed to a Hamiltonian with only non-degenerate periodic orbits (including the iterated ones), see [ 11, 12]. The same result is true in the context of Riemannian metrics: every Riemannian metric can be perturbed to a Riemannian metric with only non-degenerate closed geodesics, this is the bumpy metric theorem, see [ 1, 2, 4]. The question was investigated only much more recently in the context of Mañé perturbations of convex Hamiltonians, see [ 9, 10]. It is proved in [ 10] that the same result holds: if $H$ is a convex Hamiltonian and $a$ is a regular value of $H$, then there exist arbitrarily small potentials $g$ such that all periodic orbits (including iterated ones) of $H+g$ at energy $a$ are non-degenerate. The proof given in [ 10] is actually rather similar to the ones given in papers on the perturbations of Riemannian metrics. In all these proofs, it is very useful to work in appropriate coordinates around an orbit segment. In the Riemannian case, one can use the so-called Fermi coordinates. In the Hamiltonian case, appropriate coordinates are considered in [ 10,Lemma 3.1] itself taken from [ 3, Lemma C.1]. However, as we shall detail below, the proof of this Lemma in [ 3], Appendix C, is incomplete, and the statement itself is actually wrong. Our goal in the present paper is to state and prove a corrected version of this normal form Lemma. Our proof is different from the one outlined in [ 3], Appendix C. In particular, it is purely Hamiltonian and does not rest on the results of [ 7] on Finsler metrics, as [ 3] did. Although our normal form is weaker than the one claimed in [ 10], it is actually sufficient to prove the main results of [ 6, 10], as we shall explain after the statement of Theorem 1, and probably also of the other works using [ 3, Lemma C.1].

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