Electromagnetic Levitation: A Nonlinear Analysis Approach

In this paper, a nonlinear dynamics approach for analyzing the time evolution of an electromagnetically levitated droplet is proposed. The analysis was performed on the experimental data acquired from a levitation instrument developed by Space Power Institute at Auburn University. Several nonlinear dynamics tools were applied in order to reveal whether the time evolution of the droplet is deterministic (periodic, quasiperiodic or chaotic) or random. Quantities characterizing time series data such as the attractor dimension or the largest Lyapunov exponent were computed. It was mainly found that the underlying dynamics of the molten droplet is in fact chaotic.