Applied/ACMS/absS14

ACMS Abstracts: Spring 2014

Harvey Segur (Colorado)

The nonlinear Schrödinger equation, dissipation and ocean swell

The focus of this talk is less about how to solve a particular mathematical model, and more about how to find the right model of a physical problem.

The nonlinear Schrödinger (NLS) equation was discovered as an approximate model of wave propagation in several branches of physics in the 1960s. It has become one of the most studied models in mathematical physics, because of its interesting mathematical structure and because of its wide applicability – it arises naturally as an approximate model of surface water waves, nonlinear optics, Bose-Einstein condensates and plasma physics.

In every physical application, the derivation of NLS requires that one neglect the (small) dissipation that exists in the physical problem. But our studies of water waves (including freely propagating ocean waves, called “ocean swell”) have shown that even though dissipation is small, neglecting it can give qualitatively incorrect results. This talk describes an ongoing quest to find an appropriate generalization of NLS that correctly predicts experimental data for ocean swell. As will be shown, adding a dissipative term to the usual NLS model gives correct predictions in some situations. In other situations, both NLS and dissipative NLS give incorrect predictions, and the “right model” is still to be found.

This is joint work with Diane Henderson, at Penn State.