Nonlinear Waves are a fascinating interdisciplinary topic, overarching all STEM areas. Already centuries ago, nonlinear water waves as Tsunamis or tidal waves were known and frightened at the same time due to their spectacular and often desastrous actions. In 1834, the observation and following description of a nonlinear solitary water wave by John Scott Russel represent the starting point of scientific treatment of nonlinear waves. Nowadays, we know that the interaction of nonlinear behaviour and dissipation creates stable wave packets that propagate without changes, so-called solitons. Solitons are meanhwile known not only in hydrodynamics, but in solid state physics, particle physics, and especially in optics. Optical solitons allow a number of attractive applications in Information processing and telecommunications.
The focus of the lecture is on the basics of formation and existence of solitons, its manifestation in different fields in natural sciences, and on actual developments of soliton physics. We also will discuss novel nonlinear waves as rogue waves or monster waves.
This lecture will be based on the flipped classroom principle, i.e. the contents will be made available before lectures. The lecture itself comprises understanding of most important and challenging topics, based on students needs and feedback, and units for in-depth understanding of the topic including examples, virtual and real experiments, reading articles paper club, short impulse presentation of actual research. students are encouraged to actively participate in designing and adapting this lecture to their ideas.
- Lehrende/r: Cornelia Denz
- Lehrende/r: Jörg Imbrock