are equations for slowly changing amplitudes and phases of a oscillatory system which are obtained by averaging an initial set of equations with respect to the period of high reference frequency having the same scale as the frequency of eigen oscillations of the system.

is a process of achieving population inversion by sweeping the mismatch between a pump radiation frequency and a quantum transition frequency with passing through resonance. The lower limit of the detuning rate is the relaxation constants of the atomic system, whereas its upper limit is the adiabatic condition, which retains quasi-equilibrium between the state of the atomic system and radiation field during the whole process.

is crossing the boundary of instability of a system at which the sign of the real part of the complex characteristic root reverses and above which the undamped self-modulation regime sets in. The bifurcation can be either subcritical when the finite amplitude of oscillations jumps to set in immediately above a bifurcation point or supercritical when the amplitude of intensity oscillations is infinitely small at the instability threshold but grows as the control parameter moves away from the bifurcation point.

is a set in the phase space where the trajectories remain. This zone of the phase space attracts all the trajectories originating inside a certain region called its basin of attraction.

is the phenomenon of a sudden expansion, contraction or disappearance of the attractor when a...