This book provides a historical account of the discovery in 1834 of a remarkable singular wave that was ultimately to lead to the development of modern soliton theory with its diverse physical applications. In terms of associated geometry, the classical work of Bäcklund and Bianchi and its consequences is recounted, notably with regard to nonlinear superposition principles, which later were shown to be generic to soliton systems and which provide the analytic description of complex multi-soliton interaction. Whereas the applications of modern soliton in certain areas of physics are well-documented, deep connections between soliton theory and nonlinear continuum mechanics have had a separate development. This book describes wide applications in such disparate areas as elastostatics, elastodynamics, superelasticity, shell theory, magnetohydrostatics and magnetohydrodynamics, and will appeal to research scientists and advanced students with an interest in integrable systems in nonlinear physics or continuum mechanics.

Soliton theory is an important branch of applied mathematics and mathematical physics. An active and productive field of research, it has important applications in fluid mechanics, nonlinear optics, classical and quantum fields theories etc. This book presents a broad view of soliton theory. It gives an expository survey of the most basic ideas and methods, such as physical background, inverse scattering, Backlünd transformations, finite-dimensional completely integrable systems, symmetry, Kac-moody algebra, solitons and differential geometry, numerical analysis for nonlinear waves, and gravitational solitons. Besides the essential points of the theory, several applications are sketched and some recent developments, partly by the authors and their collaborators, are presented.

In the 25 years of its existence Soliton Theory has drastically expanded our understanding of “integrability” and contributed a lot to the reunification of Mathematics and Physics in the range from deep algebraic geometry and modern representation theory to quantum field theory and optical transmission lines.The book is a systematic introduction to the Soliton Theory with an emphasis on its background and algebraic aspects. It is the first one devoted to the general matrix soliton equations, which are of great importance for the foundations and the applications.Differential algebra (local conservation laws, Bäcklund-Darboux transforms), algebraic geometry (theta and Baker functions), and the inverse scattering method (Riemann-Hilbert problem) with well-grounded preliminaries are applied to various equations including principal chiral fields, Heisenberg magnets, Sin-Gordon, and Nonlinear Schrödinger equation.

A coherent introduction to the complete range of soliton theory including Hirota's method and Backlund transformations. Details physical applications of soliton theory with chapters on the peculiar wave patterns of the Andaman Sea, atmospheric phenomena, general relativity and Davydov solitons. Contains testing for full integrability, a discussion of the Painlevé technique, symmetries and conservation law.

In this engaging book, the concept of the soliton is traced from the beginning of the last century to modern times with its recent applications.

This volume is an introduction to nonlinear waves and soliton theory in the special environment of compact spaces such a closed curves and surfaces and other domain contours. It assumes familiarity with basic soliton theory and nonlinear dynamical systems. The first part of the book introduces the mathematical concept required for treating the manifolds considered, providing relevant notions from topology and differential geometry. An introduction to the theory of motion of curves and surfaces - as part of the emerging field of contour dynamics - is given. The second and third parts discuss the modeling of various physical solitons on compact systems, such as filaments, loops and drops made of almost incompressible materials thereby intersecting with a large number of physical disciplines from hydrodynamics to compact object astrophysics. This book is intended for graduate students and researchers in mathematics, physics and engineering. This new edition has been thoroughly revised, expanded and updated.

A good deal of the material presented in this book has been prepared by top experts in the field lecturing in January 1987 at the Winter School on Solitons in Tiruchirapalli,India. The lectures begin at an elementary level but go on to include even the most recent developments in the field. The book makes a handy introduction to the various facets of the soliton concept, and will be useful both to newcomers to the field and to researchers who are interested in developments in new branches of physics and mathematics.