Dynamics of solitary waves in hydrogen-bonded chains

Abstract

The interaction of solitary waves in hydrogen-bonded chains is investigated numerically. The physical model consists of two interacting sublattices of harmonically coupled protons and heavy ions. The protons can move in symmetric double-well potentials created by the pair of nearest-neighbor heavy ions. The proton displacement fields admit solitary kink and antikink solutions and the corresponding solitary displacements of the heavy ions are bell shaped. It is shown here that during head-on collisions the coupled-solitary-wave solutions do not preserve their shapes. Therefore, solitary waves in hydrogen-bonded chains are, in general, not solitons.