A Four-Leaf Chaotic Attractor of a Three-Dimensional Dynamical System

A three-dimensional autonomous dynamical system proposed by Pehlivan is untypical in simultaneously possessing both unbounded and chaotic solutions. Here, this topic is studied in some depth, both numerically and analytically. We find, by standard methods, that four-leaf chaotic orbits result from a period-doubling cascade; we identify unstable fixed points and both stable and unstable periodic orbits; and we examine how initial data determines whether orbits approach infinity or a stable periodic orbit. Further, we describe and apply a strict numerical verification method that rigorously proves the existence of sequences of period doublings.