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Small-amplitude periodic travelling waves in dimer Fermi–Pasta–Ulam–Tsingou lattices without symmetry

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 August 2025

Timothy Faver*
Affiliation:
Department of Mathematics, Kennesaw State University, Marietta, GA, USA
Hermen Jan Hupkes
Affiliation:
Mathematical Institute, Universiteit Leiden, Leiden, Zuid-Holland, The Netherlands
Jay Douglas Wright
Affiliation:
Department of Mathematics, Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA, USA
*
Corresponding author: Timothy Faver; Email: tfaver1@kennesaw.edu
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Abstract

We prove the existence of small-amplitude periodic travelling waves in dimer Fermi–Pasta–Ulam–Tsingou (FPUT) lattices without assumptions of physical symmetry. Such lattices are infinite, one-dimensional chains of coupled particles in which the particle masses and/or the potentials of the coupling springs can alternate. Previously, periodic travelling waves were constructed in a variety of limiting regimes for the symmetric mass and spring dimers, in which only one kind of material data alternates. The new results discussed here remove the symmetry assumptions by exploiting the gradient structure and translation invariance of the travelling wave problem. Together, these features eliminate certain solvability conditions that symmetry would otherwise manage and facilitate a bifurcation argument involving a two-dimensional kernel and cokernel.

Information

Type
Research Article
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution and reproduction, provided the original article is properly cited.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press.
Figure 0

Figure 1. The symmetric mass and spring dimers. (a) A mass dimer with alternating masses m1 and m2 and identical springs. (b) A spring dimer with alternating springs and identical masses m.

Figure 1

Figure 2. A general dimer with alternating masses and springs.

Figure 2

Figure 3. Graphs of the two branches $\widetilde{\lambda}_{\pm}(K)$ of the dispersion relation against $c^2K^2$ for $|c| \lt c_{\star}$ and $|c| \gt c_{\star}$. Solid black circles indicate intersections of $c^2K^2$ and $\widetilde{\lambda}_-(K)$ at K = 0 for all c and of $c^2K^2$ and $\widetilde{\lambda}_+(K)$ only at $K=\pm\omega_c$ when $|c| \gt c_{\star}$. Solid red circles indicate potential intersections of $c^2K^2$ and $\widetilde{\lambda}_+(K)$ for $K \ne 0$ when $|c| \lt c_{\star}$. While not graphed, $c^2K^2$ and $\widetilde{\lambda}_+(K)$ could also have intersections in addition to $K = \pm\omega_c$ when $|c| \lt c_{\star}$.