edited by Mingzhou Ding (Florida Atlantic University, USA) , William L Ditto (Georgia Institute of Technology, USA) , Louis M Pecora (Naval Research Laboratory, USA) , & Mark L Spano (Naval Surface Warfare Center, USA)

The 5th Experimental Chaos Conference was a gathering of scientists and engineers who work on real-world systems that behave in a nonlinear and, often, chaotic fashion. The proceedings present discoveries of chaotic behavior, explanation of nonlinear phenomena in the laboratory, and applications of nonlinear and chaotic effects to devices and techniques for improving performance and surmounting technical obstacles. Experimental work is presented on chaos in semiconductor superlattices, spatiotemporal chaos in magnetic materials, instabilities in magnetic fluids, bifurcations of hexagonal patterns in lasers, and discrete rotating waves. New phenomena are exhibited on amplitude death in coupled oscillators, vortex crystals, wakes in soap films, chaotic dynamics of ocean waves, and microscopic chaos. Applications of chaotic dynamics are offered in the areas of chaotic pulse trains in digital communications, detection of changes in EEGs, detection of unstable periodic orbits in noisy data, cellular automata and warfare, detection of n:m phase synchronization, methods in acoustic chaos, chaos in the machine tool-cutting process, and a nonlinear airfoil. The broad range of topics and fields touches on a wide variety of systems whose behavior is now better understood and applied through the use of chaotic dynamics.

• Condensed Matter:
  • Self-Organized Quasiparticles and Other Patterns in Planar Gas-Discharge Systems (H-G Purwins et al.)
  • Controllable Bifurcation Processes in Undoped, Photoexcited GaAs/A1As Superlattices (K J Luo et al.)
• Control:
  • Analyzing Time-Delay Feedback Systems (R Hegger et al.)
  • Chaos Control in Fast Systems Using Occasional Feedback (N J Corron et al.)
• Electronics:
  • Characteristic Relations of Type-III Intermittency in an Electronic Circuit (C-M Kim et al.)
  • Chaotic Pulse Trains in Digital Communications (M Sushchik et al.)
• Spatiotemporal:
  • Continuum Coupled Maps: A Model for Patterns in Vibrated Sand (E Ott & S C Venkataramani)
  • Pattern Control with Spatial Perturbations in a Wide Aperture Laser (R Meucci et al.)
• Biology:
  • Robust Detection of Dynamical Change in Scalp Egg (P C Gailey et al.)
  • Detection of Unstable Periodic Orbits in Noisy Data, and Choosing the Right Surrogates (K Dolan et al.)
• Synchronization:
  • Experimental Manifestations of Phase and Lag Synchronizations in Coupled Chaotic Systems (Y-C Lai et al.)
  • Amplitude Death in Coupled Opto-Thermal Oscillators (R Herrero et al.)
• Banquet Talk:
  • Case Study in “Experimental Complexity” — An Artificial-Life Approach to Modeling Warfare (A Ilachinski)
• Optics:
  • Adaptive Control of Strong Chaos (F T Arecchi)
  • Optical Implementation of Chaotic Maps with Mach-Zehnder Interferometers (K Umeno et al.)
• Quantum Chaos:
  • Methods in Acoustic Chaos (C Ellegaard & K Schaadt)
• Mechanics:
  • Stability Transitions in a Nonlinear Airfoil (L Virgin et al.)
  • Ray Chaos in Quadratic Index Media: A Non-Mechanical Application of Mechanics (R Tagg & M Asadi-Zeydabadi)
• Hydrodynamics:
  • Dynamics, Statistics and Vortex Crystals in the Relaxation of 2D Turbulence (C F Driscoll et al.)
  • Growth of Disordered Features in a Two-Dimensional Cylinder Wake (P Vorobieff & R E Ecke)
• General:
  • Experimental Evidence for Microscopic Chaos (M E Briggs et al.)
  • Magnetic Resonance Imaging of Structure and Coarsening in Three-Dimensional Foams (B A Prause & J A Glazier)
  • and other papers