Duffing Attractor

Written by Paul Bourke
March 1998

Listen (m4a or midi) to the Duffing attractor, the x and y values are sonified as two instruments.


The solution to the Duffing equations is often used as an example of a classic chaotic system. The Duffing system of differential equations is

dx / dt = y

dy / dt = x - x3 - a y + b cos(w t)

where typically, a = 0.25, b = 0.3, w = 1

The following shows a "typical" segment of (x,y) values.

A longer sequence of the x variable is

The following 4 diagrams show 2D system for various combinations of a, b, w.