Multisoliton solutions of the KdV equation satisfy nonlinear ordinary differential equations which are known as stationary equations for the KdV hierarchy, or sometimes as Lax-Novikov equations. An interesting feature of these equations, known since the 1970's, is that they can be explicitly integrated, by virtue of being finite-dimensional completely integrable Hamiltonian systems. Here we use the integration theory to investigate the question of whether the multisoliton solutions are the only nonsingular solutions of these ordinary differential equations which vanish at infinity. In particular we prove that this is indeed the case for $2$-soliton solutions of the fourth-order stationary equation.
In this paper we prove instability of the soliton for the focusing, mass-critical generalized KdV equation. We prove that the solution to the generalized KdV equation for any initial data with mass smaller than the mass of the soliton and close to the soliton in $L^{2}$ norm must eventually move away from the soliton.
We consider solutions of the generalized Korteweg-de Vries equations (gKdV) which are non dispersive in some sense (in the spirit of [18]) and which remain close to multi-solitons. We show that these solutions are necessarily pure multi-solitons. For the Korteweg-de Vries equation (KdV) and the modified Korteweg-de Vries equation (mKdV) in particular, we obtain a characterization of multi-solitons and multi-breathers in terms of non-dispersion.
We consider KdV-type equations with $C^1$ nonhomogeneous nonlinearities and small dispersion $\varepsilon$. The first result consists in the conclusion that, in the leading term with respect to $\varepsilon$, the solitary waves in this model interact like KdV solitons. Next it turned out that there exists a very interesting scenario of instability in which the short-wave soliton remains stable whereas a small long-wave part, generated by perturbations of original equation, turns to be unstable, growing and destroying the leading term. At the same time, such perturbation can eliminate the colli…
In this paper we study the stability problem for KdV solitons on the left and right half-line. Unlike standard KdV, these are not exact solutions to the equations posed in the half-line. However, we are able to show that solitons placed initially far away from the origin are strongly stable for the problem posed on the right half-line, assuming homogeneous boundary conditions. For the problem posed on the left half-line, the positive infinitetime stability problem makes no sense for the case of KdV solitons, but in this setting we prove a result of stability for all negative times. The proof i…
In this work, we consider the stability of solitons for the KdV equation below the energy space, using spatially-exponentially-weighted norms. Using a combination of the $I$-method and spectral analysis following Pego and Weinstein, we are able to show that, in the exponentially weighted space, the perturbation of a soliton decays exponentially for arbitrarily long times. The finite time restriction is due to a lack of global control of the unweighted perturbation.
We revisit the phenomenon of instability of solitons in the generalized Korteweg-de Vries equation, $u_t + \partial_x(u_{xx} + u^p) = 0$. It is known that solitons are unstable for nonlinearities $p \geq 5$, with the critical power $p=5$ being the most challenging case to handle. The critical case was proved by Martel-Merle in [11], where the authors crucially relied on the pointwise decay estimates of the linear KdV flow. In this paper, we show simplified approaches to obtain the instability of solitons via truncation and monotonicity, which can be also useful for other KdV-type equations.
In this short note, we consider the global dynamics of the defocusing generalized KdV equations: u_t + u_{xxx} = (|u|^{p-1}u)_x. We use Tao's theorem that the energy moves faster than mass to prove a moment type dispersion estimate. As an application of the dispersion estimate, we show that there is no soliton-like solutions with decaying assumption.
In this note we prove scattering for perturbations of solitons in the scaling space appropriate for the quartic nonlinearity, namely $\dot{H}^{-\frac16}$. The article relies strongly on refined estimates for a KdV equation linearized at the soliton. In contrast to the work of Tao (2006), we are able to work purely in the scaling space without additional regularity assumptions, allowing us to prove some results on the existence of inverse wave operators.
We consider a quasilinear KdV equation that admits compactly supported traveling wave solutions (compactons). This model is one of the most straightforward instances of degenerate dispersion, a phenomenon that appears in a variety of physical settings as diverse as sedimentation, magma dynamics and shallow water waves. We prove the existence and uniqueness of solutions with sufficiently smooth, spatially localized initial data.
We study the long-time stability of soliton solutions to the Korteweg-deVries equation. We consider solutions $u$ to the KdV with initial data in $H^s$, $0 \leq s < 1$, that are initially close in $H^s$ norm to a soliton. We prove that the possible orbital instability of these ground states is at most polynomial in time. This is an analogue to the $H^s$ orbital instability result of \cite{CKSTT3}, and obtains the same maximal growth rate in $t$. Our argument is based on the {``}$I$-method{\rq\rq} used in \cite{CKSTT3} and other papers of Colliander, Keel, Staffilani, Takaoka and Tao, which pus…
In this paper we study uniqueness properties of solutions of the k-generalized Korteweg-de Vries equation. Our goal is to obtain sufficient conditions on the behavior of the difference $u_1-u_2$ of two solutions $u_1, u_2$ of the equation at two different times $t_0=0$ and $t_1=1$ which guarantee that $u_1\equiv u_2$.
The soliton resolution for the focusing modified Korteweg-de vries (mKdV) equation is established for initial conditions in some weighted Sobolev spaces. Our approach is based on the nonlinear steepest descent method and its reformulation through $\bar{\partial}$-derivatives. From the view of stationary points, we give precise asymptotic formulas along trajectory $x=\textrm{v}t$ for any fixed $ \textrm{v} $. To extend the asymptotics to solutions with initial data in low regularity spaces, we apply a global approximation via PDE techniques. As byproducts of our long-time asymptotics, we also o…
In this paper, we reconsider the well-known result of Pego-Weinstein \cite{MR1289328} that soliton solutions to the Korteweg-deVries equation are asymptotically stable in exponentially weighted spaces. In this work, we recreate this result in the setting of modern well-posedness function spaces. We obtain asymptotic stability in the exponentially weighted space via an iteration argument. Our purpose here is to lay the groundwork to use the $I$-method to obtain asymptotic stability below $H^1$, which will be done in a second, forthcoming paper \cite{PR}. This will be possible because the expone…
In this article, we will prove $L^2(\mathbb{R})$-stability of $1$-solitons for the KdV equation by using exponential stability property of the semigroup generated by the linearized operator. The proof follows the lines of recent stability argument of Mizumachi [Asymptotic stability of lattice solitons in the energy space, Comm. Math. Phys., (2009)] and Mizumachi, Pego and Quintero [Asymptotic stability of solitary waves in the Benney-Luke model of water waves, Differential Integral Equations, (2013)] which show stability in the energy class by using strong linear stability of solitary waves in…
In this paper we obtain the following stability result for periodic multi-solitons of the KdV equation: We prove that under any given semilinear Hamiltonian perturbation of small size $\varepsilon > 0$, a large class of periodic multi-solitons of the KdV equation, including ones of large amplitude, are orbitally stable for a time interval of length at least $O(\varepsilon^{-2})$. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first stability result of such type for periodic multi-solitons of large size of an integrable PDE.
We consider the following variational problem: minimize the $(n+1)$st polynomial conserved quantity of KdV over $H^n(\mathbb{R})$ with the first $n$ conserved quantities constrained. Maddocks and Sachs used that $n$-solitons are local minimizers for this problem in order to prove that $n$-solitons are orbitally stable in $H^n(\mathbb{R})$. Given $n$ constraints that are attainable by an $n$-soliton, we show that there is a unique set of $n$ amplitude parameters so that the corresponding multisolitons satisfy the constraints. Moreover, we prove that these multisolitons are the unique global con…
We show how the inverse scattering transform can be used as a convenient tool to derive the long-time asymptotics of shock waves for the Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equation in the soliton region. In particular, we improve the results previously obtained via the nonlinear steepest decent approach both with respect to the decay of the initial conditions as well as the region where they are valid.
We revisit the asymptotic analysis of the KdV shock problem in the soliton region. Our approach is based on the analysis of the associated Riemann-Hilbert problem and we extend the domain of validity of the asymptotic formulas while at the same time requiring less decay and smoothness for the initial data.
An initial-boundary value problem for a generalized KdV equation posed on a half-line is considered. Existence and uniqueness of global regular solutions for arbitrary smooth initial data are established.
We consider the problem of the soliton propagation, in a slowly varying medium, for a generalized Korteweg - de Vries equations (gKdV). We study the effects of inhomogeneities on the dynamics of a standard soliton. We prove that slowly varying media induce on the soliton solution large dispersive effects at large time. Moreover, unlike gKdV equations, we prove that there is no pure-soliton solution in this regime.
We address two pressing questions in the theory of the Korteweg--de Vries (KdV) equation. First, we show the uniqueness of solutions to KdV that are merely bounded, without any further decay, regularity, periodicity, or almost periodicity assumptions. The second question, emphasized by Deift, regards whether almost periodic initial data leads to almost periodic solutions to KdV. Building on the new observation that this is false for the Airy equation, we construct an example of almost periodic initial data whose KdV evolution remains bounded, but fails to be almost periodic at a later time. Ou…
We prove in this paper the stability and asymptotic stability in H^1 of a decoupled sum of N solitons for the subcritical generalized KdV equations $u_t+(u_{xx}+u^p)_x=0$ (1<p<5). The proof of the stability result is based on energy arguments and monotonicity of local L^2 norm. Note that the result is new even for p=2 (the KdV equation). The asymptotic stability result then follows directly from a rigidity theorem in [15].
We consider the Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equation, and prove that small localized data yields solutions which have dispersive decay on a quartic time-scale. This result is optimal, in view of the emergence of solitons at quartic time, as predicted by inverse scattering theory.
This paper is concerned with the interaction of two solitons of nearly equal speeds for the (BBM) equation. This work is an extension of the results obtained in arXiv:0910.3204 by the same authors, addressing the same question for the quartic (gKdV) equation. First, we prove that the two solitons are preserved by the interaction and that for all time they are separated by a large distance, as in the case of the integrable (KdV) equation in this regime. Second, we prove that the collision is not perfectly elastic, except in the integrable case (i.e. in the limiting case of the (KdV) equation).
We provide conditions for existence of hyperbolic, unbounded periodic and elliptic solutions in terms of Weierstrass $\wp$ functions of both third and fifth-order KdV--BBM (Korteweg-de Vries--Benjamin, Bona \& Mahony) regularized long wave equation. An analysis for the initial value problem is developed together with a local and global well-posedness theory for the third-order KdV--BBM equation. Traveling wave reduction is used together with zero boundary conditions to yield solitons and periodic unbounded solutions, while for nonzero boundary conditions we find solutions in terms of Weierstra…
We prove local in time well-posedness for a class of quasilinear Hamiltonian KdV-type equations with periodic boundary conditions, more precisely we show existence, uniqueness and continuity of the solution map. We improve the previous result in \cite{Mietka}, generalising the considered class of equations and improving the regularity assumption on the initial data.
A noncommutative KdV-type equation is introduced extending the Baecklund chart in [S. Carillo, M. Lo Schiavo, and C. Schiebold, SIGMA 12 (2016)]. This equation, called meta-mKdV here, is linked by Cole-Hopf transformations to the two noncommutative versions of the mKdV equations listed in [P.J. Olver and V.V. Sokolov Commun. Math. Phys. 193 (1998), Theorem 3.6]. For this meta-mKdV, and its mirror counterpart, recursion operators, hierarchies and an explicit solution class are derived.
We revisit the phenomenon of instability of solitons in the two dimensional generalization of the Korteweg-de Vries equation, the generalized Zakharov-Kuznetsov (ZK) equation, $u_t + \partial_{x_1} (Δu + u^p) = 0, (x_1,x_2) \in \mathbb R^2$. It is known that solitons are unstable in this two dimensional equation for nonlinearities $p > 3$. This was shown by Anne de Bouard in [4] generalizing the arguments of Bona-Souganidis-Strauss in [1] for the generalized KdV equation. In this paper, we use a different method to obtain the instability of solitons, namely, truncation and monotonicity propert…
Bourgain(1993) proved that the periodic modified KdV equation (mKdV) is locally well-posed in Sobolev spave H^s(T), s >= 1/2, by introducing new weighted Sobolev spaces X^s,b, where the uniqueness holds conditionally, namely in the intersection of C([0, T]; H^s) and X^s,b. In this paper, we establish unconditional well-posedness of mKdV in H^s(T), s >= 1/2, i.e. we in addition establish unconditional uniqueness in C([0, T]; H^s), s >= 1/2, of solutions to mKdV. We prove this result via differentiation by parts. For the endpoint case s = 1/2, we perform careful quinti- and septi-linear estimate…
We consider the approximate control of solitons in generalized Korteweg-de Vries equations. By introducing a suitable internal bilinear control on the equation, we prove that any soliton is locally null controllable, and moreover, any soliton can be accelerated to any particular positive velocity, after a suitable large amount of time. Precise estimates on the error terms and the rate of decay in the approximate null controllability result are also given. Our method introduces a new insight on the control of nonlinear objects, from the point of view of interaction and collision problems for no…
Solitary waves are localized gravity waves that preserve their consistency and henceforth their visibility through properties of nonlinear hydrodynamics. Solitary waves have finite amplitude and spread with constant speed and constant shape. In this paper, we have used Lie group of transformation method to solve (3 + 1)-dimensional KdV type equation. We have obtained the infinitesimal generators, commutator table of Lie algebra for the KdV type equation. We have achieved a number of exact solutions of KdV type equation in the explicit form through similarity reduction. All the reported results…
We analytically study the long time and large space asymptotics of a new broad class of solutions of the KdV equation introduced by Dyachenko, Zakharov, and Zakharov. These solutions are characterized by a Riemann--Hilbert problem which we show arises as the limit $N\to \infty$ of a gas of $N$-solitons. We show that this gas of solitons in the limit $N \to \infty$ is slowly approaching a cnoidal wave solution for $x \to - \infty$ (up to terms of order $\mathcal{O} (1/x)$), while approaching zero exponentially fast for $x\to+\infty$. We establish an asymptotic description of the gas of solitons…
We study the dynamics of solitons as solutions to the perturbed KdV (pKdV) equation $\partial_t u = -\partial_x (\partial_x^2 u + 3u^2-bu)$, where $b(x,t) = b_0(hx,ht)$, $h\ll 1$ is a slowly varying, but not small, potential. We option an explicit description of the trajectory of the soliton parameters of scale and position on the dynamically relevant time scale $δh^{-1}\log h^{-1}$, together with an estimate on the error of size $h^{1/2}$. In addition to the Lyapunov analysis commonly applied to these problems, we use a local virial estimate due to Martel-Merle (2005). The results are support…
In this paper we express tau functions for the Korteweg de Vries (KdV) equation, as Laplace transforms of iterated Skorohod integrals. Our main tool is the notion of Fredholm determinant of an integral operator. Our result extends the paper of Ikeda and Taniguchi who obtained a stochastic representation of tau functions for the $N$-soliton solutions of KdV as the Laplace transform of a quadratic functional of $N$ independent Ornstein-Uhlenbeck processes. Our general result goes beyond the $N$-soliton case and enables us to consider a non soliton solution of KdV associated to a Gaussian process…
We consider the KdV equation $$ \partial_t u +\partial^3_x u +u\partial_x u=0 $$ with quasi-periodic initial data whose Fourier coefficients decay exponentially and prove existence and uniqueness, in the class of functions which have an expansion with exponentially decaying Fourier coefficients, of a solution on a small interval of time, the length of which depends on the given data and the frequency vector involved. For a Diophantine frequency vector and for small quasi-periodic data (i.e., when the Fourier coefficients obey $|c(m)| \le \varepsilon \exp(-κ_0 |m|)$ with $\varepsilon > 0$ suffi…
We consider the Cauchy problem for the KdV hierarchy -- a family of integrable PDEs with a Lax pair representation involving one-dimensional Schrödinger operators -- under a local in time boundedness assumption on the solution. For reflectionless initial data, we prove that the solution stays reflectionless. For almost periodic initial data with absolutely continuous spectrum, we prove that under Craig-type conditions on the spectrum, Dirichlet data evolve according to a Lipschitz Dubrovin-type flow, so the solution is uniquely recovered by a trace formula. This applies to algebro-geometric (f…
We announce a detailed investigation of limits of N-soliton solutions of the Korteweg-deVries (KdV) equation as $N$ tends to infinity. Our main results provide new classes of KdV-solutions including in particular new types of soliton-like (reflectionless) solutions. As a byproduct we solve an inverse spectral problem for one-dimensional Schrödinger operators and explicitly construct smooth and real-valued potentials that yield a purely absolutely continuous spectrum on the nonnegative real axis and give rise to an eigenvalue spectrum that includes any prescribed countable and bounded subset of…
We study the long-time dynamics of complex-valued modified Korteweg-de Vries (mKdV) solitons, which are recognized because they blow-up in finite time. We establish stability properties at the H^1 level of regularity, uniformly away from each blow-up point. These new properties are used to prove that mKdV breathers are H^1 stable, improving our previous result, where we only proved H^2 stability. The main new ingredient of the proof is the use of a Bäcklund transformation which links the behavior of breathers, complex-valued solitons and small real-valued solutions of the mKdV equation. We als…
We prove that solitons (or solitary waves) of the Zakharov-Kuznetsov (ZK) equation, a physically relevant high dimensional generalization of the Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equation appearing in Plasma Physics, and having mixed KdV and nonlinear Schrödinger (NLS) dynamics, are strongly asymptotically stable in the energy space in the physical region. We also prove that the sum of well-arranged solitons is stable in the same space. Orbital stability of ZK solitons is well-known since the work of de Bouard. Our proofs follow the ideas by Martel and Martel and Merle, applied for generalized KdV equat…
We present a rigorous theory of a unified and simple inverse scattering transform (IST) for both focusing and defocusing real nonlocal (reverse-space-time) modified Korteweg-de Vries (mKdV) equations with non-zero boundary conditions (NZBCs) at infinity. The IST problems for the nonlocal equations with NZBCs are more complicated then ones for the local equations with NZBCs. The suitable uniformization variable is introduced in order to make the direct and inverse problems be established on a complex plane instead of a two-sheeted Riemann surface. The direct scattering problem establishes the a…
Multi-soliton solutions of the Korteweg-de Vries equation (KdV) are shown to be globally L2-stable, and asymptotically stable in the sense of Martel-Merle. The proof is surprisingly simple and combines the Gardner transform, which links the Gardner and KdV equations, together with the Martel-Merle-Tsai and Martel-Merle recent results on stability and asymptotic stability in the energy space, applied this time to the Gardner equation. As a by-product, the results of Maddocks-Sachs and Merle-Vega are improved in several directions.
We prove the nonlinear stability of the KdV solitary waves considered as solutions of the KP-II equation, with respect to periodic transverse perturbations.
In this note we show that the Novikov-Veselov equation at positive energy (an analog of KdV in 2+1 dimensions) has no exponentially localized solitons ( in the two-dimensional sense).
Rarefactive waves and dispersive shock waves are generated from the step-like initial data in many nonlinear evolution equations including the classical example of the Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equation. When a solitary wave is injected on the step-like initial data, it is either transmitted over the background or trapped in the rarefactive wave. We show that the transmitted soliton can be obtained by using the Darboux transformation for the KdV equation. On the other hand, no trapped soliton can be obtained by using the Darboux transformation and we show with numerical simulations that the trap…
We show that the Novikov--Veselov equation (an analog of KdV in dimension 2 + 1) at positive and negative energies does not have solitons with the space localization stronger than O(|x|^{-3}) as |x| \to \infty.
We construct a definition of the weak solution to KdV type equations with small dispersion admitting the zero dispersion limit for soliton-like solutions. Using this definition, we obtain a system of equations (the limit problem as the dispersion tends to zero) that describes the soliton dynamics.
Soliton theory and the theory of Hankel (and Toeplitz) operators have stayed essentially hermetic to each other. This paper is concerned with linking together these two very active and extremely large theories. On the prototypical example of the Cauchy problem for the Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equation we demonstrate the power of the language of Hankel operators in which symbols are conveniently represented in terms of the scattering data for the Schrodinger operator associated with the initial data for the KdV equation. This approach yields short-cuts to already known results as well as to a va…
