English

Interactions and Asymptotics of Dispersive Shock Waves -- Korteweg-de Vries Equation

Pattern Formation and Solitons 2015-06-12 v1 Exactly Solvable and Integrable Systems

Abstract

The long-time asymptotic solution of the Korteweg-de Vries equation for general, step-like initial data is analyzed. Each sub-step in well-separated, multi-step data forms its own single dispersive shock wave (DSW); at intermediate times these DSWs interact and develop multiphase dynamics. Using the inverse scattering transform and matched-asymptotic analysis it is shown that the DSWs merge to form a single-phase DSW, which is the `largest' one possible for the boundary data. This is similar to interacting viscous shock waves (VSW) that are modeled with Burgers' equation, where only the single, largest-possible VSW remains after a long time.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1301.1032,
  title  = {Interactions and Asymptotics of Dispersive Shock Waves -- Korteweg-de Vries Equation},
  author = {Mark J. Ablowitz and Douglas E. Baldwin},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1301.1032},
  year   = {2015}
}

Comments

5 pages, 3 figures