Spectral curve, Darboux coordinates and Hamiltonian structure of periodic dressing chains

A chain of one-dimensional Schr\"odinger operators connected by successive Darboux transformations is called the ``Darboux chain'' or ``dressing chain''. The periodic dressing chain with period $N$ has a control parameter $\alpha$. If $\alpha \not= 0$, the $N$-periodic dressing chain may be thought of as a generalization of the fourth or fifth (depending on the parity of $N$) Painlev\'e equations . The $N$-periodic dressing chain has two different Lax representations due to Adler and to Noumi and Yamada. Adler's $2 \times 2$ Lax pair can be used to construct a transition matrix around the periodic lattice. One can thereby define an associated ``spectral curve'' and a set of Darboux coordinates called ``spectral Darboux coordinates''. The equations of motion of the dressing chain can be converted to a Hamiltonian system in these Darboux coordinates. The symplectic structure of this Hamiltonian formalism turns out to be consistent with a Poisson structure previously studied by Veselov, Shabat, Noumi and Yamada.