This volume contains lectures and invited papers from the Focus Program on "Nonlinear Dispersive Partial Differential Equations and Inverse Scattering" held at the Fields Institute from July 31-August 18, 2017. The conference brought together researchers in completely integrable systems and PDE with the goal of advancing the understanding of qualitative and long-time behavior in dispersive nonlinear equations. The program included Percy Deift’s Coxeter lectures, which appear in this volume together with tutorial lectures given during the first week of the focus program. The research papers collected here include new results on the focusing ​nonlinear Schrödinger (NLS) equation, the massive Thirring model, and the Benjamin-Bona-Mahoney equation as dispersive PDE in one space dimension, as well as the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili II equation, the Zakharov-Kuznetsov equation, and the Gross-Pitaevskii equation as dispersive PDE in two space dimensions. The Focus Program coincided with the fiftieth anniversary of the discovery by Gardner, Greene, Kruskal and Miura that the Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equation could be integrated by exploiting a remarkable connection between KdV and the spectral theory of Schrodinger's equation in one space dimension. This led to the discovery of a number of completely integrable models of dispersive wave propagation, including the cubic NLS equation, and the derivative NLS equation in one space dimension and the Davey-Stewartson, Kadomtsev-Petviashvili and Novikov-Veselov equations in two space dimensions. These models have been extensively studied and, in some cases, the inverse scattering theory has been put on rigorous footing. It has been used as a powerful analytical tool to study global well-posedness and elucidate asymptotic behavior of the solutions, including dispersion, soliton resolution, and semiclassical limits.

Nonlinear Dispersive Equations are partial differential equations that naturally arise in physical settings where dispersion dominates dissipation, notably hydrodynamics, nonlinear optics, plasma physics and Bose-Einstein condensates. The topic has traditionally been approached in different ways, from the perspective of modeling of physical phenomena, to that of the theory of partial differential equations, or as part of the theory of integrable systems. This monograph offers a thorough introduction to the topic, uniting the modeling, PDE and integrable systems approaches for the first time in book form. The presentation focuses on three "universal" families of physically relevant equations endowed with a completely integrable member: the Benjamin-Ono, Davey-Stewartson, and Kadomtsev-Petviashvili equations. These asymptotic models are rigorously derived and qualitative properties such as soliton resolution are studied in detail in both integrable and non-integrable models. Numerical simulations are presented throughout to illustrate interesting phenomena. By presenting and comparing results from different fields, the book aims to stimulate scientific interactions and attract new students and researchers to the topic. To facilitate this, the chapters can be read largely independently of each other and the prerequisites have been limited to introductory courses in PDE theory.

The first part of the book provides an introduction to key tools and techniques in dispersive equations: Strichartz estimates, bilinear estimates, modulation and adapted function spaces, with an application to the generalized Korteweg-de Vries equation and the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili equation. The energy-critical nonlinear Schrödinger equation, global solutions to the defocusing problem, and scattering are the focus of the second part. Using this concrete example, it walks the reader through the induction on energy technique, which has become the essential methodology for tackling large data critical problems. This includes refined/inverse Strichartz estimates, the existence and almost periodicity of minimal blow up solutions, and the development of long-time Strichartz inequalities. The third part describes wave and Schrödinger maps. Starting by building heuristics about multilinear estimates, it provides a detailed outline of this very active area of geometric/dispersive PDE. It focuses on concepts and ideas and should provide graduate students with a stepping stone to this exciting direction of research.​

Nonlinear Dispersive Equations are partial differential equations that naturally arise in physical settings where dispersion dominates dissipation, notably hydrodynamics, nonlinear optics, plasma physics and Bose-Einstein condensates. The topic has traditionally been approached in different ways, from the perspective of modeling of physical phenomena, to that of the theory of partial differential equations, or as part of the theory of integrable systems. This monograph offers a thorough introduction to the topic, uniting the modeling, PDE and integrable systems approaches for the first time in book form. The presentation focuses on three "universal" families of physically relevant equations endowed with a completely integrable member: the Benjamin-Ono, Davey-Stewartson, and Kadomtsev-Petviashvili equations. These asymptotic models are rigorously derived and qualitative properties such as soliton resolution are studied in detail in both integrable and non-integrable models. Numerical simulations are presented throughout to illustrate interesting phenomena. By presenting and comparing results from different fields, the book aims to stimulate scientific interactions and attract new students and researchers to the topic. To facilitate this, the chapters can be read largely independently of each other and the prerequisites have been limited to introductory courses in PDE theory.

Introduces nonlinear dispersive partial differential equations in a detailed yet elementary way without compromising the depth and richness of the subject.

This book provides a self-contained presentation of classical and new methods for studying wave phenomena that are related to the existence and stability of solitary and periodic travelling wave solutions for nonlinear dispersive evolution equations. Simplicity, concrete examples, and applications are emphasized throughout in order to make the material easily accessible. The list of classical nonlinear dispersive equations studied include Korteweg-de Vries, Benjamin-Ono, and Schrodinger equations. Many special Jacobian elliptic functions play a role in these examples. The author brings the reader to the forefront of knowledge about some aspects of the theory and motivates future developments in this fascinating and rapidly growing field. The book can be used as an instructive study guide as well as a reference by students and mature scientists interested in nonlinear wave phenomena.

The third volume in this sequence of books consists of a collection of contributions that aims to describe the recent progress in nonlinear differential equations and nonlinear dynamical systems (both continuous and discrete). Nonlinear Systems and Their Remarkable Mathematical Structures: Volume 3, Contributions from China just like the first two volumes, consists of contributions by world-leading experts in the subject of nonlinear systems, but in this instance only featuring contributions by leading Chinese scientists who also work in China (in some cases in collaboration with western scientists). Features Clearly illustrate the mathematical theories of nonlinear systems and its progress to both the non-expert and active researchers in this area Suitable for graduate students in Mathematics, Applied Mathematics and some of the Engineering sciences Written in a careful pedagogical manner by those experts who have been involved in the research themselves, and each contribution is reasonably self-contained