Oscillations in chemical systems. IV. Limit cycle behavior in a model of a real chemical reaction

The chemical mechanism of Field, Körös, and Noyes for the oscillatory Belousov reaction has been generalized by a model composed of five steps involving three independent chemical intermediates. The behavior of the resulting differential equations has been examined numerically, and it has been shown that the system traces a stable closed trajectory in three dimensional phase space. The same trajectory is attained from other phase points and even from the point corresponding to steady state solution of the differential equations. The model appears to exhibit limit cycle behavior. By stiffly coupling the concentrations of two of the intermediates, the limit cycle model can be simplified to a system described by two independent variables; this coupled system is amenable to analysis by theoretical techniques already developed for such systems.