Nonlinear waves and solitons in physical systems

Advances in nonlinear science have been plentiful in recent years. In parti cular, interest in nonlinear wave propagation continues to grow, stimulated by new applications, such as fiber-optic communication systems, as well as the many classical unresolved issues of fluid dynamics. What is arguably t he turning point for the modern perspective of nonlinear systems took place at Los Alamos over 40 years ago with the pioneering numerical simulations of Fermi, Pasta, and Ulam. A decade later, this research initiated the next major advance of Zabusky and Kruskal that motivated the revolution in comp letely integrable systems. With this in mind, the conference on Nonlinear W aves in Solitons in Physical Systems (NWSPS) was organized by the Center fo r Nonlinear Studies (CNLS) at Los Alamos National Laboratory in May of 1997 , to assess the current state-of-the-art in this very active field. Papers from the conference attendees as well as from researchers unable to attend the conference were collected in this special volume of Physica D. In this paper, the contributions to the conference and to this special issue are re viewed, with an emphasis on the many unifying principles that all these wor ks share. Copyright (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.