Hopping probabilities in a chaotic attractor

The residence time around different parts of a chaotic attractor is studied experimentally for nonlinear dynamical system with a double-scroll. It is shown that the dynamics of jumping from one scroll of the attractor to the other produces a distinct low-frequency peak in the otherwise featureless noise-like background produced by the chaotic dynamics. This peak can be interpreted as a distribution of residence times and follows a lognormal distribution. A few similarities with the phenomenon of stochastic resonances are also highlighted. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.