Critical parameters of an oval billiard with an elliptical component

TL;DR

This paper analyzes how combining elliptical and oval boundary deformations in billiards affects the transition to chaos, deriving critical parameters and revealing regimes where chaos is suppressed.

Contribution

It introduces an analytical expression for the critical parameter in combined billiards and uncovers a regime where elliptic deformation suppresses chaos.

Findings

Increasing elliptical component lowers the chaos threshold.

In-phase deformation components can restore invariant curves.

Analytical and numerical methods confirm the suppression of chaos.

Abstract

We explore the critical parameters responsible for the transition from integrability to chaos in a family of billiards combining elliptical and oval deformations. Unlike standard oval billiards, where a known critical parameter governs the destruction of the last invariant curve, the introduction of an integrable elliptic component yields a second deformation axis. We derive an analytical expression for the critical parameter in this combined system and validate it numerically using Slater's theorem, showing that increasing the elliptical component lowers the critical threshold for global chaos. Moreover, we uncover a previously unexplored regime: when the two deformation components are in phase, the elliptic contribution progressively suppresses chaos, leading to the restoration of invariant curves and periodic orbits. A first-order analytical approximation confirms this behavior, supported by numerical validation. Our results reveal how the interplay between distinct boundary deformations enriches phase-space organization and offers enhanced controllability of chaotic dynamics in billiard systems.