Physics of Solitons [Paperback]

This textbook gives an instructive view of solitons and their applications for advanced students of physics.Solitons are exceptionally stable standing waves which appear in many areas of physics. This book introduces the basic properties of solitons using examples from macroscopic physics before presenting the main theoretical methods. It then discusses applications from solid state, atomic and biological physics. There is an emphasis throughout on a new approach to modelling nonlinearities using the soliton equations. Based on the authors' graduate course, this textbook gives an instructive view of the physics of solitons for students with a basic knowledge of physics, and classical and quantum mechanics.Solitons are exceptionally stable standing waves which appear in many areas of physics. This book introduces the basic properties of solitons using examples from macroscopic physics before presenting the main theoretical methods. It then discusses applications from solid state, atomic and biological physics. There is an emphasis throughout on a new approach to modelling nonlinearities using the soliton equations. Based on the authors' graduate course, this textbook gives an instructive view of the physics of solitons for students with a basic knowledge of physics, and classical and quantum mechanics.The basic properties of solitons are introduced here using examples from macroscopic physics (e.g. blood pressure pulses and fibre optical communications). The book then presents the main theoretical methods before discussing applications from solid state or atomic physics such as dislocations, excitations in spin chains, conducting polymers, ferroelectrics and Bose-Einstein condensates. Examples are also taken from biological physics and include energy transfer in proteins and DNA fluctuations. Throughout the book the authors emphasize a new approach to modelling nonlinearities in physics.List of Portraits; Preface; Part I. Different Classes of Solitons: Introduction; lñ