Numerical study of Kapitza pendulum

Abstract: A driven pendulum with vertical oscillations of pendulum support (Kapitza pendulum) possesses a number of unusual properties and is a popular object of both analytical and numerical studies. Although some spectacular results can be obtained, such as the vertical position of the pendulum under certain conditions might become stable, no explicit analytical solution for the pendulum trajectory is known. We carry out a numerical study of Kapitza pendulum for a number of different physical regimes. Comparison is made with the limiting cases where the exact solution is known.