George M. Zaslavsky (Cyrillic: Георгий Моисеевич Заславский) (31 May 1935 – 25 November 2008) was a Soviet mathematical physicist and one of the founders of the physics of dynamical chaos.George Zaslavsky
at New York University

Early life

Zaslavsky was born in Odessa, Ukraine on 31 May 1935. His father was an artillery officer who dragged his cannon in World War II and survived there. Zaslavsky received his education at the University of Odessa and moved to

Novosibirsk Novosibirsk (, also ; rus, Новосиби́рск, p=nəvəsʲɪˈbʲirsk, a=ru-Новосибирск.ogg) is the largest city and administrative centre of Novosibirsk Oblast and Siberian Federal District in Russia. As of the Russian Census ...

in 1957 where a golden age of Siberian physics was beginning.

Career

In 1965, Zaslavsky joined the Institute of Nuclear Physics where he became interested in nonlinear problems of accelerator and

plasma Plasma or plasm may refer to: Science * Plasma (physics), one of the four fundamental states of matter * Plasma (mineral), a green translucent silica mineral * Quark–gluon plasma, a state of matter in quantum chromodynamics Biology * Blood pla ...

physics. Roald Sagdeev and

Boris Chirikov Boris Valerianovich Chirikov (russian: Борис Валерианович Чириков; 6 June 1928 – 12 February 2008) was a Soviet and Russian physicist. He was the founder of the physical theory of Hamiltonian chaos and made pione ...

helped him form an interest in the theory of dynamical chaos. In 1968, Zaslavsky and his colleagues introduced a separatrix map that became one of the major tools in the theoretical study of

Hamiltonian chaos A Hamiltonian system is a dynamical system governed by Hamilton's equations. In physics, this dynamical system describes the evolution of a physical system such as a planetary system or an electron in an electromagnetic field. These systems can b ...

. The work "Stochastical instability of nonlinear oscillations" by G. Zaslavsky and B. Chirikov, published in '' Physics Uspekhi'' in 1971, was the first review paper to "open the eyes" of many physicists to the power of the dynamical systems theory and modern

ergodic theory Ergodic theory (Greek: ' "work", ' "way") is a branch of mathematics that studies statistical properties of deterministic dynamical systems; it is the study of ergodicity. In this context, statistical properties means properties which are expres ...

. It was realized that very complicated behavior is possible in dynamical systems with only a few

degrees of freedom Degrees of freedom (often abbreviated df or DOF) refers to the number of independent variables or parameters of a thermodynamic system. In various scientific fields, the word "freedom" is used to describe the limits to which physical movement or ...

. This complexity cannot be adequately described in terms of individual trajectories and requires statistical methods. Typical Hamiltonian systems are not integrable but

chaotic Chaotic was originally a Danish trading card game. It expanded to an online game in America which then became a television program based on the game. The program was able to be seen on 4Kids TV (Fox affiliates, nationwide), Jetix, The CW4Kids ...

, and this chaos is not homogeneous. At the same values of the control parameters, there coexist regions in the

phase space In dynamical system theory, a phase space is a space in which all possible states of a system are represented, with each possible state corresponding to one unique point in the phase space. For mechanical systems, the phase space usually ...

with regular and chaotic motion. The results obtained in the 60th were summarized in the book "Statistical Irreversibility in Nonlinear Systems" (Nauka, Moscow, 1970). The end of the 1960s was a difficult time for Zaslavsky. He was forced to leave the Institute of Nuclear Physics in Novosibirsk for signing letters in defense of some

Soviet dissidents Soviet dissidents were people who disagreed with certain features of Soviet ideology or with its entirety and who were willing to speak out against them. The term ''dissident'' was used in the Soviet Union in the period from the mid-1960s until t ...

. Zaslavsky got a position at the Institute of Physics in Krasnoyarsk, not far away from Novosibirsk. There he founded a laboratory of the theory of nonlinear processes which still exists today. In Krasnoyarsk he became interested in the theory of quantum chaos. The first rigorous theory of quantum resonance was developed in 1977. He introduced the important notion of quantum break time (the

Ehrenfest time Ehrenfest is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Paul Ehrenfest (1880-1933), Austrian physicist and mathematician ** Ehrenfest equations ** Ehrenfest model ** Ehrenfest paradox ** Ehrenfest theorem ** 32796 Ehrenfest * Tatjana Ehr ...

) after which quantum evolution begins to deviate from a semiclassical one. The results obtained in Krasnoyarsk were summarized in the book ''Chaos in Dynamical Systems'' (Nauka, Moscow and Harwood, Amsterdam, 1985). In 1981, Zaslavsky and Sadrilla Abdullaev published the first paper on chaotic instability of sound rays in idealized underwater waveguides. The first results of their studies on this topic were summarized in a review paper published in ''Physics Uspekhi'' in 1991. Now it is a well-developed branch in ocean acoustics known as ray and wave chaos in underwater sound channels. In 1984, Roald Sagdeev invited Zaslavsky to the

Institute of Space Research An institute is an organisational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations (research institutes) created to do research on specific topics, or can also be a professional body. In some countries, institutes can ...

in Moscow. There he has worked on the theory of degenerate and almost degenerate Hamiltonian systems, anomalous chaotic transport, plasma physics, and theory of chaos in waveguides. The book ''Nonlinear Physics: from the Pendulum to Turbulence and Chaos'' (Nauka, Moscow and Harwood, New York, 1988), written with Sagdeev, is now a classical textbook for chaos theory. When studying interaction of a charged particle with a wave packet, Zaslavsky with colleagues from that institute discovered that stochastic layers of different separatrices in degenerated Hamiltonian systems may merge producing a stochastic web. Unlike the famous Arnold diffusion in non-degenerated Hamiltonian systems, that appears only if the number of degrees of freedom exceeds 2, diffusion in the Zaslavsky webs is possible at one and half

. This diffusion is rather universal phenomenon and its speed is much greater than that of Arnold diffusion. Beautiful symmetries of the Zaslavsky webs and their properties in different branches of physics have been described in the book ''Weak Chaos and Quasi-Regular Structures'' (Nauka, Moscow, 1991 and Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1991) coauthored with R. Sagdeev, D. Usikov, and A. Chernikov.

In the United States

In 1991 Zaslavsky emigrated to the United States and became a Professor of Physics and Mathematics at the Physics Department of New York University and the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. There he studied the principal problems of Hamiltonian chaos connected with anomalous kinetics and fractional dynamics, foundations of

statistical mechanics In physics, statistical mechanics is a mathematical framework that applies statistical methods and probability theory to large assemblies of microscopic entities. It does not assume or postulate any natural laws, but explains the macroscopic be ...

, chaotic advection, quantum chaos, and long-range propagation of

acoustic wave Acoustic waves are a type of energy propagation through a medium by means of adiabatic loading and unloading. Important quantities for describing acoustic waves are acoustic pressure, particle velocity, particle displacement and acoustic intensit ...

s in the ocean. In his New York period, he published two seminal books on the Hamiltonian chaos: ''Physics of Chaos in Hamiltonian Systems'' (Imperial College Press, London, 1998) and ''Hamiltonian Chaos and Fractional Dynamics'' (Oxford University Press, New York, 2005). Zaslavsky was one of the key persons in the theory of dynamical chaos who made important contributions to a variety of other subjects. He authored and coauthored nine books and more than 300 papers in scientific journals. His books and papers influenced and are influencing very much in advancing modern nonlinear science.

Books (in English)

* G. M. Zaslavsky, Chaos in Dynamic Systems. New-York: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1985. 370 pages. (3-7186-0225-3) * R. Z. Sagdeev, D. A. Usikov, G. M. Zaslavsky, Nonlinear Physics: From the Pendulum to Turbulence and Chaos. New-York: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1988. (3-7186-4832-6) * G. M. Zaslavsky, R. Z. Sagdeev, D. A. Usikov, A. A. Chemikov, Weak Chaos and Quasi-Regular Patterns. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. 265 pages * G. M. Zaslavsky, Physics of Chaos in Hamiltonian Dynamics. London: Imperial College Press, 1998. 350 pages (1-86094-795-6) * G. M. Zaslavsky, Hamiltonian Chaos and Fractional Dynamics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. (0-19-852604-0). * D. Makarov, S. Prants, A. Virovlyansky, and G. Zaslavsky. Ray and wave chaos in ocean acoustics (Chaos in waveguides). World Scientific Press: Singapore, 2009.

Early life

Career

In the United States

Books (in English)

References

Further reading