Dependency of the positive and negative long-time behaviors of flows on surfaces

TL;DR

This paper explores the relationship between positive and negative long-term behaviors of flows on surfaces, extending the Poincaré-Bendixson theorem by demonstrating their dependence and classifying possible limit sets.

Contribution

It establishes the dependence between $oldsymbol{ ext{ω}}$-limit and $oldsymbol{ ext{α}}$-limit sets on surfaces, generalizing the classical theorem and analyzing limit sets in area-preserving flows.

Findings

Dependence between ω-limit and α-limit sets on surfaces.

Classification of ω-limit sets in area-preserving flows.

Tameness and wildness of surgeries on singular points.

Abstract

Long-time behavior is one of the most fundamental properties in dynamical systems. The limit behaviors of flows on surfaces are captured by the Poincar\'e-Bendixson theorem using the $\omega$-limit sets. This paper demonstrates that the positive and negative long-time behaviors are not independent. In fact, we show the dependence between the $\omega$-limit sets and the $\alpha$-limit sets of points of flows on surfaces, which partially generalizes the Poincar\'e-Bendixson theorem. Applying the dependency result to solve what kinds of the $\omega$-limit sets appear in the area-preserving (or, more generally, non-wandering) flows on compact surfaces, we show that the $\omega$-limit set of any non-closed orbit of such a flow with arbitrarily many singular points on a compact surface is either a subset of singular points or a locally dense Q-set. Moreover, we show the wildness of surgeries to add totally disconnected singular points and the tameness of those to add finitely many singular points for flows on surfaces.