This book describes the remarkable connections that exist between the classical differential geometry of surfaces and modern soliton theory. The authors also explore the extensive body of literature from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by such eminent geometers as Bianchi, Darboux, Backlund, and Eisenhart on transformations of privileged classes of surfaces which leave key geometric properties unchanged. Prominent amongst these are Backlund-Darboux transformations with their remarkable associated nonlinear superposition principles and importance in soliton theory. It is with these transformations and the links they afford between the classical differential geometry of surfaces and the nonlinear equations of soliton theory that the present text is concerned. In this geometric context, solitonic equations arise out of the Gaus-Mainardi-Codazzi equations for various types of surfaces that admit invariance under Backlund-Darboux transformations. This text is appropriate for use at a higher undergraduate or graduate level for applied mathematicians or mathematical physics.

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Bäcklund and Darboux transformations : geometry and modern applications in soliton theory

This work develops the geometry and dynamics of mechanical systems with nonholonomic constraints and symmetry from the perspective of Lagrangian mechanics and with a view to control theoretical applications. The basic methodology is that of geometric mechanics applied to the formulation of Lagrange d'Alembert, generalizing the use of connections and momentum maps associated with a given symmetry group to this case. We begin by formulating the mechanics of nonholonomic systems using an Ehresmann connection to model the constraints, and show how the curvature of this connection enters into Lagrange's equations. Unlike the situation with standard configuration space constraints, the presence of symmetries in the nonholonomic case may or may not lead to conservation laws. However, the momentum map determined by the symmetry group still satisfies a useful differential equation that decouples from the group variables. This momentum equation, which plays an important role in control problems, involves parallel transport operators and is computed explicitly in coordinates. An alternative description using a ``body reference frame'' relates part of the momentum equation to the components of the Euler-Poincar\'{e} equations along those symmetry directions consistent with the constraints. One of the purposes of this paper is to derive this evolution equation for the momentum and to distinguish geometrically and mechanically the cases where it is conserved and those where it is not. An example of the former is a ball or vertical disk rolling on a flat plane and an example of the latter is the snakeboard, a modified version of the skateboard which uses momentum coupling for locomotion generation. We construct a synthesis of the mechanical connection and the Ehresmann connection defining the constraints, obtaining an important new object we call the nonholonomic connection. When the nonholonomic connection is a principal connection for the given symmetry group, we show how to perform Lagrangian reduction in the presence of nonholonomic constraints, generalizing previous results which only held in special cases. Several detailed examples are given to illustrate the theory. September 1994 Revised, March 1995 Revised, June 1995

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Nonholonomic Mechanical Systems with Symmetry

A classification of discrete integrable systems on quad-graphs, i.e. on surface cell decompositions with quadrilateral faces, is given. The notion of integrability laid in the basis of the classification is the three-dimensional consistency. This property yields, among other features, the existence of the discrete zero curvature with a spectral parameter. For all integrable systems of the obtained exhaustive list, the so called three-leg forms are found. This establishes Lagrangian and symplectic structures for these systems, and the connection to discrete systems of the Toda type on arbitrary graphs. Generalizations of these ideas to the three-dimensional integrable systems and to the quantum context are also discussed.

Classification of integrable equations on quad-graphs. The consistency approach

The main purpos e of this chapter is to present a direct and systematic way of finding exact solutions and Backlund transformations of a certain class of nonlinear evolution equations. The nonlinear evolution equations are transformed, by changing the dependent variable(s), into bilinear differential equations of the following special form 
 
$$ F\left( {\frac{\partial }{{\partial t}} - \frac{\partial }{{\partial {t^1}}},\frac{\partial }{{\partial x}} - \frac{\partial }{{\partial {x^1}}}} \right)f(t,x)f({t^1},{x^1}){|_{t = {t^1},x = {x^1}}} = 0 $$ 
 
, which we solve exactly using a kind of perturbational approach.

Direct Methods in Soliton Theory (非線形現象の取扱いとその物理的課題に関する研究会報告)

Variational iteration method for solving Burger's and coupled Burger's equations

A geometric reduction of a nonlinear system of hydrodynamic type incorporating a collision-term is made to a constrained integrable, inhomogeneous Heisenberg spin equation.

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1751-8113/45/43/432002/pdf

Connection of an integrable inhomogeneous Heisenberg spin equation to a hydrodynamic-type system with collision term

Eigenfunctions are shown to constitute privileged coordinates of self-dual Einstein spaces with the underlying governing equation being revealed as the general heavenly equation. The formalism developed here may be used to link algorithmically a variety of known heavenly equations. In particular, the classical connection between Plebanski's first and second heavenly equations is retrieved and interpreted in terms of eigenfunctions. In addition, connections with travelling wave reductions of the recently introduced TED equation which constitutes a 4+4-dimensional integrable generalisation of the general heavenly equation are found. These are obtained by means of (partial) Legendre transformations. As a particular application, we prove that a large class of self-dual Einstein spaces governed by a compatible system of dispersionless Hirota equations is genuinely four-dimensional in that the (generic) metrics do not admit any (proper or non-proper) conformal Killing vectors. This generalises the known link between a particular class of self-dual Einstein spaces and the dispersionless Hirota equation encoding three-dimensional Einstein-Weyl geometries.

Self-dual Einstein spaces and the general heavenly equation. Eigenfunctions as coordinates

The Euler equations for an inviscid and thermally nonconducting gas are investigated with a view to isolating particular integrable structure. A natural physical constraint is imposed and it is demonstrated that, in the generic case, the steady Euler equations are equivalent to an integrable Heisenberg spin equation subject to a volume-preserving constraint. A limiting case in which this constraint is not present is indicated.

The Euler Equations of Spatial Gasdynamics and the Integrable Heisenberg Spin Equation

Integrable substructure in 2+1-dimensional anisentropic magneto-gasdynamics is investigated via a general elliptic vortex ansatz. The procedure involves introduction of a q-Gaussian density representation. Thermodynamically consistent relations are isolated associated with certain integrable Hamiltonian reductions.

On q-Gaussian Integrable Hamiltonian Reductions in Anisentropic Magneto-gasdynamics

A novel class of integrable surfaces is recorded. This class of O surfaces is shown to include and generalize classical surfaces such as isothermic, constant mean curvature, minimal, `linear' Weingarten, Guichard and Petot surfaces and surfaces of constant Gaussian curvature. It is demonstrated that the construction of a Backlund transformation for O surfaces leads in a natural manner to an associated parameter-dependent linear representation. The classical pseudosphere and breather pseudospherical surfaces are generated.

Wolfgang K. Schief

Papers

Connection of an integrable inhomogeneous Heisenberg spin equation to a hydrodynamic-type system with collision term

Self-dual Einstein spaces and the general heavenly equation. Eigenfunctions as coordinates

The Euler Equations of Spatial Gasdynamics and the Integrable Heisenberg Spin Equation

On q-Gaussian Integrable Hamiltonian Reductions in Anisentropic Magneto-gasdynamics

On the unification of classical and novel integrable surfaces: II. Difference geometry