The University of Sydney

School of Mathematics and Statistics

Integrable Systems: Assessment 2

MATH440x: Applied Mathematics Honours Semester 2, 2018
Lecturer: Nalini Joshi, Milena Radnović and Yang Shi

Due 11:59pm, Wednesday 03 October 2018

The University of Sydney students should submit scanned or typeset answers to TurnItIn on
LMS Canvas.
Students from other universities should submit scanned or typeset answers by emailing to:
nalini.joshi@sydney.edu.au.

1. Transform the solution u(x, t) of the KdV equation by taking

∂2
u=2 log f.
∂x2

(a) Find the fourth-order PDE satisfied by f (x, t).

(b) Suppose f is given by the formal series

f = 1 + f1 + 2 f2 + . . . ,

for sufficiently small  < 1. Find the PDEs satisfied by f1 , f2 , f3 .

(0)
(c) Below we use ξj = kj x−ωj t+ξj , for some constants kj , ωj , ξj , j = 1, . . . , N .
(i) Show that
f1 = exp(ξ1 ), fj = 0, for j ≥ 2, (1)
gives a one-soliton solution of the KdV.
(ii) Take
f1 = exp(ξ1 ) + exp(ξ2 ). (2)
Assume fj = 0 for j ≥ 3. Find f2 . Write down the corresponding solution
of the KdV.
(d) Apply the x-part of the Bäcklund transformation (BT) for the Potential KdV to
deduce a corresponding transformation of f (x, t). Denote the new function by
f˜(x, t).
(i) Find a general expansion of f˜ in powers of .
(ii) Assume f = 1 + f1 , where f1 is given by Equation (1). What is the cor-
responding f˜ given by the BT. (Note that care needs to be taken with any
constants that arise in the BT.)

Copyright
c 2018 The University of Sydney