Numerical Integration of Constrained Hamiltonian Systems Using Dirac Brackets

Reference: Mathematics of Computation, 68 (1999) 661-681

Description: This paper represents the real starting point of my work on the numerical analysis of constrained Hamiltonian systems. It proposes the use of the Hamilton-Dirac equations of motion as basis of the numerical integration. Some theoretical considerations of the stability of this approach with respect to the drift off the constraint manifolds are given. The results are checked at two concrete test problems, the ubiquitous pendulum and a planar chain molecule. In practice, it is however probably better to use these ideas in a more indirect way as discussed in [15] .

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