Nonlinear Chaotic Systems: Approaches and Implications for Science and Engineering-A Tutorial

In the last few years a great deal of attention has been devoted to detecting and to a certain extent, qualifying complex dynamics produced by nonlinear systems. Most techniques developed for the analysis of linear systems is totally inadequate for handling nonlinear systems in a systematic, consistent and global way. This paper presents a brief introduction to some of the main concepts and tools used in the analysis of nonlinear dynamical systems and chaos with an emphasis on the signal processing aspects. Acquaintance with such approaches usually enables a better understanding of a number of phenomena which otherwise would remain unclear or even go unnoticed. The main objectives of this tutorial are to present a readable introduction to the subject avoiding as much as possible any mathematics, to mention a few implications for real problems and to provide several references for further reading.