George M. Zaslavsky (1929–2008) was a Soviet‑born mathematical physicist who made foundational contributions to the theory of dynamical chaos. He introduced the map that now bears his name in a 1978 paper titled "The Simplest Case of a Strange Attractor," published in Physics Letters A. The map was derived as a stroboscopic description of a dissipative kicked rotor — a rotating system that receives periodic impulses and loses energy through friction.
Zaslavsky later moved to the United States, joining New York University's physics department and the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. He authored several books on Hamiltonian chaos and fractional dynamics. The Scholarpedia article on the Zaslavsky map, written by Zaslavsky himself in 2007, provides an authoritative technical reference.
Classical Zaslavsky maps operate on two real variables (action and angle). The complex variant used by FractalPark, with its sine perturbation and fixed complex multiplier, is a creative adaptation suitable for escape‑time rendering rather than a direct transcription of the original dissipative system.