This phenomenon was first described in 1834 by John Scott Russell in the Union Canal of Scotland. For 10 points each:
[10m] Identify these wave packets that maintain their shape while traveling at constant velocity. They are solutions to the Korteweg-de Vries, or KdV equation.
ANSWER: solitons
[10h] Also notable for having soliton solutions, this equation is named in reference to the field equation of spin-0 particles. In one-dimension, this partial differential equation reads u-sub-tt minus u-sub-xx plus a certain function of u equals zero.
ANSWER: Sine-Gordon equation
[10e] Solitons can arise as a result of a transformation named “inverse [this process].” More generally, this process is the changing of a particle’s trajectory due to interactions with a different particle.
ANSWER: scattering
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