Runge-Kutta-Nyström symplectic splitting methods of order 8

Abstract: Different families of Runge-Kutta-Nystr\"om (RKN) symplectic splitting methods of order 8 are presented for second-order systems of ordinary differential equations and are tested on numerical examples. They show a better efficiency than state-of-the-art symmetric compositions of 2nd-order symmetric schemes and RKN splitting methods of orders 4 and 6 for medium to high accuracy. For some particular examples, they are even more efficient than extrapolation methods for high accuracies and integrations over relatively short time intervals.