Chaotic Dynamics & Geometric Integration

Notice how explicit midpoint drifts away from the initial energy over time. The implicit midpoint method utilizes a nonlinear solver at each step to strictly preserve the symplectic structure, bounding the energy error completely regardless of the duration.

Simulation Parameters

A geometric (symplectic) integrator. It uses a Newton-Raphson nonlinear solver at every step to find the implicit solution, exhibiting bounded energy error for non-separable Hamiltonians.

120° 45°
Double Pendulum Trace
Tracing the path of the lower mass.
Total System Energy: 0.00 J
ENERGY DRIFT DETECTED!
Energy Evolution
The Y-axis is tightly bounded (±2.5% deviation) to highlight the slow drift of non-geometric methods.