AppDynSys : Bifurcation Examples : Buckling Beam

It's easy to find physical examples of supercritical pitchfork bifurcations. One of the simplest comes from looking at a buckling beam, modelled here using springs. The state is the deflection at the middle, and the parameter is the load. No load means a stable equilibrium at zero. After the load increases past the bifurcation point: boom! It buckles, but to one of two symmetric stable states.