Year: 2020
Type: article
Abstract: The Benjamin-Feir, or modulational, instability has been regarded as the main mechanism of spontaneous disintegration of broad weakly nonlinear wavepackets in deep water waves. We report water wave experiments with another result. For a range of initial parameters, a nearly rectangular initial wavepacket develops a strongly nonlinear modulation with two dispersive shock waves expanding from the edges of the wavepacket towards the center at finite speed. This is supported by theory based on the semiclassical limit of the one-dimensional focusing nonlinear Schrodinger equation.
Source: Physical Review Fluids
Institutions: École Centrale de Nantes, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Laboratoire de Recherche Hydrodynamique, Energétique et Environnement Atmosphérique, Nantes Université, Université de Lille, Laboratoire de Physique des Lasers, Atomes et Molécules, Université Paris Sciences et Lettres, École Normale Supérieure - PSL, Sorbonne Université, Laboratoire de Physique de l'Ecole Normale Supérieure, Université Paris Diderot, Institut Jean Le Rond d'Alembert, Université Paris Cité, Laboratoire Matière et Systèmes Complexes, Northumbria University
Language: English
Topic: Nonlinear Waves and Solitons
Subfield: Statistical and Nonlinear Physics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
Awards: Integrable turbulence and rogue waves: semi-classical nonlinear Schrödinger equation framework, G4343425493, Centre Européen pour les Mathématiques, la Physique et leurs Interactions, Dynamical and statistical properties of the large scales in turbulence, G6803667113, G6907540958, G7584481536
OpenAlex ID: W3014291396