Non-integrability of a Weakly Integrable Hamiltonian System

The geometric approach to mechanics based on the Jacobi metric allows to easily construct natural mechanical systems which are integrable (actually separable) at a fixed value of the energy. The aim of the present paper is to investigate the dynamics of a simple prototype system outside the zero-energy hypersurface. We find that the general situation is that in which integrability is not preserved at arbitrary values of the energy. The structure of the Hamiltonian in the separating coordinates at zero energy allows a perturbation treatment of this system at energies slightly different from zero, by which we obtain an analytical proof of non-integrability.This revised version was published online in October 2005 with corrections to the Cover Date.