Higher-dimensional targeting

This paper describes a procedure to steer rapidly successive iterates of an initial condition on a chaotic attractor to a small target region about any prespecified point on the attractor using only small controlling perturbations. Such a procedure is called ‘‘targeting.’’ Previous work on targeting for chaotic attractors has been in the context of one- and two-dimensional maps. Here it is shown that targeting can also be done in higher-dimensional cases. The method is demonstrated with a mechanical system described by a four-dimensional mapping whose attractor has two positive Lyapunov exponents and a Lyapunov dimension of 2.8. The target is reached by making very small successive changes in a single control parameter. In one typical case, 35 iterates on average are required to reach a target region of diameter ${10}^{\mathrm{-}4}$, as compared to roughly ${10}^{11}$ iterates without the use of the targeting procedure.