Branch Switching from Coincident Bifurcation Points*

The definition of the solution set of a general non-linear structural problem depending on one external parameter is considered. Path-following techniques and singular point locating and identifying methods are reviewed, followed by so-called branch-switching methods used to detect secondary equilibrium paths associated with m-fold bifurcation points. Two methods introduced by Keller [[1] Keller, H. B. 1977. “Numerical solution of bifurcation and nonlinear eigenvalue problems”. In Applications of Bifurcation Theory Edited by: Rabinowitz, P. New York: Academic Press. [Google Scholar]] and Kearfott [[2] Kearfott, R. B. 1983. Some general bifurcation techniques. SIAM J. Sci. Stat. Comput., 4: 52–68. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]] are considered, and their performance when used together with the non-linear finite element method is verified.