Written for an interdisciplinary readership of physicists, engineers, and chemists, this book is a practical guide to the fascinating world of solitons. These waves of large amplitude propagate over long distances without dispersing and therefore show one of the most striking aspects of nonlinearity. The author addresses students, practitioners, and researchers, approaching the subject from the standpoint of applications in optics, hydrodynamics, and electrical and chemical engineering. The book also encourages the readers to perform their own experiments. Since the printing of the second edition of this book, there has been a large growth in the literature on nonlinear waves and so has the wide applicability of the subject to the physical, chemical and biological sciences. Accordingly, this third edition has been thoroughly revised. Some of the topics are brought up to date with pertinent references. Furthermore, the book now includes a completely new chapter on solitary waves in diffuse systems.

Klappentext

Written for an interdisciplinary readership, this book is a practical guide to the fascinating world of solitons. The author approaches the subject from the standpoint of applications in optics, hydrodynamics, and electrical and chemical engineering. This third edition has been thoroughly revised and updated.

Inhalt

1 Basic Concepts and the Discovery of Solitons.- 2 Linear Waves in Electrical Transmission Lines.- 3 Solitons in Nonlinear Transmission Lines.- 4 More on Transmission-Line Solitons.- 5 Hydrodynamic Solitons.- 6 Mechanical Solitons.- 7 Fluxons in Josephson Transmission Lines.- 8 Solitons in Optical Fibers.- 9 The Soliton Concept in Lattice Dynamics.- 10 A Look at Some Remarkable Mathematical Techniques.- 11 Diffusive solitons.- References.