Papers

Chip-scale microresonator-based frequency combs, commonly referred to as microcombs, are promising sources for field-deployable metrology applications. However, intrinsic microresonator noise can make it difficult to generate microcombs with sufficiently low noise for applications. A widely used approach to overcome this limitation is to trap the DKS in the microresonator by phase-modulating the pump laser, although integrating a low-noise modulation reference in a fully on-chip platform remains challenging. Here, we propose an optoelectronic self-trapping scheme in which the impact of intrinsic microresonator noise on microcomb repetition-rate jitter is suppressed through feedback-controlled phase modulation of the driving laser so that the intrinsic noise of the laser sets the ultimate performance limit. This modification eliminates the need for an external low-phase-noise RF source, thereby enabling chip integration. We develop both analytical and numerical models for the proposed system and benchmark its performance against conventional externally referenced bulk implementations, showing that the proposed approach achieves comparable microcomb noise suppression while maintaining chip-scale compatibility.

We investigate the computational capabilities of a one-dimensional lattice of negatively coupled circle maps in its traveling wave regime. We interpret propagating waves as information carriers and exploit their interactions to implement Boolean logic. The logical states are encoded by the propagation direction of the traveling waves, while the presence or absence of a wave at a designated output location represents the logical output. Using controlled wave collisions, we demonstrate the realization of NAND and NOR gates along with other basic gates. Since NAND and NOR operations are functionally complete, the results establish that the traveling wave regime of the negatively coupled circle-map lattice supports universal Boolean computation in principle. The demonstrated logical operations remain valid over a finite range of the coupling strength \epsilon and map parameter \omega, indicating robustness of the computational scheme to parameter variations. Our results therefore demonstrate that computational functionality can emerge from the collective nonlinear dynamics of a coupled map lattice, providing a con- nection between the dynamical properties of traveling wave states and collision based information processing.

Spontaneous symmetry breaking (SSB) is conventionally understood through static vacuum selection in low-energy approximations. However, the nonperturbative dynamical pathways connecting symmetric configurations to asymmetric states remain an open question. In this paper, we propose an operator-theoretic framework that characterizes $Z_{2}$ symmetry breaking in scalar field theory through spectral branching. Specifically, we identify an effective invariant manifold of the nonlinear Klein-Gordon equation termed the "symmetric dual breather mode," whose phase-space geometry is traced using a $t$-dependent finite-dimensional representation. Our analysis demonstrates that static SSB represents merely a small-amplitude limit ($A \ll \phi_{v1}$). As the amplitude increases into the heteroclinic regime ($A > \phi_{v1}$), the field dynamically overflows the central barrier, yielding a vanishing time-averaged order parameter ($\langle \phi \rangle = 0$) and driving a geometric curvature cancellation ($\langle V''(\phi) \rangle_{t} \to 0$). Governed by a universal scaling function $\mathfrak{F}(y)$, the logarithmic period divergence near the heteroclinic boundary naturally generates sub-eV effective mass scales without fine-tuning bare parameters. Furthermore, this dynamic barrier overflow naturally favors Majorana-like self-conjugate states over Dirac-type states. Additionally, nonlinear phase interference along the heteroclinic channel induces asymmetric phase-space contraction, decoupling the right-handed mode and dynamically giving rise to the left-handed Weyl equation. These results bridge nonperturbative wave dynamics, topological mass suppression, chiral selection, and the dynamic origin of active neutrino masses.

We study the effect of boundary conditions on the selection of wavenumbers in pattern-forming systems. Prior work established that, for a large class of boundary conditions, equilibria only within a narrow band of wavenumbers are compatible with the boundary. We demonstrate here that for a large class of initial conditions, solutions evolve towards an extremal member of this narrow band of equilibria. In fact, this extremal member is neutrally stable, nonlinearly unstable, and the convergence is realized through a series of snapping events at the boundary. We observe this behavior in simulations of the Swift-Hohenberg equation when the pattern forming region is confined to a large spatial interval through a parameter quench. We prove the convergence in a phase-diffusion approximation using comparison principles and astutely chosen subsolutions that mimic the snapping behavior.

Mechanical localized modes generally retain exponentially decaying tails, whereas confinement to a single structural unit is difficult to achieve without resonators, flat-band lattices or topological design. To address this need, an asymmetric linkage system is introduced in which geometry tunes a boundary mode from finite localization to its extreme limit. Each cell comprises two unequal rigid bars connected by a torsional spring and is described by one generalized coordinate. Linearization and coordinate transformation yield a tridiagonal model and closed-form expressions for the edge mode frequency and spatial decay ratio. The analysis identifies the configurations supporting a singular edge mode at which its decay ratio vanishes, leaving only the boundary cell active in the linear regime. Simulations show near-complete localization under finite-amplitude excitation, and experiments reproduce the configuration-dependent transition from bulk transmission to boundary confinement. These results establish a minimal and analytically tunable platform for mechanical localization

Phononic frequency combs are equidistant spectral ladders generated when a driven vibrational mode transfers energy to an autoparametrically excited subharmonic mode through anharmonic intermode coupling. In previous studies, the coupling strength governing this energy transfer has typically been treated as a free parameter, extracted from a fabricated device, or adopted from an earlier calculation for a specific mode pair. As a result, whether a given crystal can support a phononic frequency comb, and the drive strength required to generate it, has not been predictable a priori. Here we obtain the complete parameter set from density functional theory. Twisted bilayers of \MoSSe{} and \MoSMoSe{} at the commensurate angle $21.787^{\circ}$ adopt space group $P3$ in a 42-atom \rootseven{} moiré supercell. The second-order force constants provide the mode frequencies; the third-order constants provide the linewidths through the Boltzmann transport equation and hence the quality factors; and the same third-order tensor projected onto the phonon eigenvectors of a chosen mode pair provides the anharmonic couplings $\kt$ and $\kss$. Both bilayers constitute a mode pair within $0.8\%$ of the $2\!:\!1$ resonance with $\omega_1/\omega_2 = 1.9923$ in \MoSSe{} and $1.9943$ in \MoSMoSe{}. By integrating the resulting two-mode equations, both modes generate combs through a discontinuous transition: at $701\,\fth$ in \MoSSe{} the envelope variance rises from $2.1\times10^{3}$ to $1.37\times10^{4}$ and the tooth count of mode 1 from 7 to 16 within a single $5\,\fth$ increment, identifying the onset as subcritical. The spectral entropy peaks before this jump, at $341\,\fth$. The two compounds carry comparable coupling, differing by a factor of $1.2$. However, the comb excitation threshold is set by the quality-factors of signal modes: $Q_2 = 672$ for \MoSSe{} and $Q_2 = 3844$ for \MoSMoSe{}.

We introduce a nonconservative nonlinear Schrödinger equation (NLSE) which includes additional nonlinear terms accounting for the pseudo-stimulated-Raman-scattering (pseudo-SRS) effect and cubic loss. An essentially novel feature of the model is the linear anti-diffusion gain, which leads to the obvious blow-up in the infinite or spatially periodic system. We consider the absorptive boundary conditions, which suppress the blow-up driven by effective convective instability in the setup. The NSLE model is derived, in the extended adiabatic approximation, from the underlying Zakharov system, which includes the viscosity term acting on its low-frequency component and the anti-diffusion gain in the high-frequency (HF) one. The latter term appears if the expansion, with respect to the deviation of the wavenumber, is performed not around the minimum-loss point (as in the usual situation), but around a maximum-loss point. Dynamics of moving solitons in the model is addressed by means of analytical and numerical methods. The sech approximation for the soliton predicts it as a stable fixed point (FP) of the system of balance equations for the HF norm and wave momentum, derived in the moving reference frame. The FP attraction basin is identified too. The predictions are corroborated by direct simulations of the full NSLE with the absorptive boundary conditions.

The evolution of matter-wave vector solitons in two dimensions under nonlinearity management is studied. The averaged over strong and rapid modulations in time of the inter-species interactions vector Gross-Pitaevskii equation is derived. The averaging gives the appearance of the effective nonlinear quantum pressure depending on the population of the other component. Using this system of equations, the dynamical stabilization of the two-dimensional vector matter-wave solitons under the management of the mean-field nonlinearity is investigated. It is shown that the nonlinear quantum pressure arrests the collapse in the averaged system, giving rise to stable vector solitons. Full numerical simulations of the original, time-dependent system of Gross-Pitaevskii equations confirm that the management strongly prolongs the lifetime of these solitons compared to the unmanaged case.

We report the experimental and numerical demonstration of stimulated Brillouin scattering-induced stabilization of Kerr-driven modulation instability in fiber Fabry–Perot resonators. We show that Brillouin scattering shapes the modulation instability spectrum into a stable multi–free-spectral-range cascade that is otherwise unstable in the absence of Brillouin effects. We further identify that this stabilization originates from the real part of the Brillouin response, leading to an asymmetric Kerr-Brillouin interaction governed by the relative position of the Brillouin frequency shift with respect to the cavity resonances. These results establish stimulated Brillouin scattering as an additional degree of freedom for controlling nonlinear dynamics in Kerr resonators.

The purpose of this work is to introduce and discuss a general framework for performing a linear instability analysis on multiplex networks, in the absence of inter-layer diffusion, with the specific motivation of detecting the Turing instability. The formalism itself is presented in full generality for $m$-unknowns, each of which arise as solutions of non-autonomous reaction-diffusion equations, on $n$-node temporal multiplex networks. In addition, we identify a class of multiplex networks for which the Laplacian matrices commute. In this setting analytical progress can be made and the explicit inequalities, governing instability, are derived. In order to explore our formalism we apply it to the specific example of a two-species predator-prey model on archipelagos. Here nodes are interpreted as islands and edges correspond to the transportation network for each species. Moreover, the non-autonomous setting is used to model a variety of natural phenomena.

We study the properties of matrix coupled oscillators in ring networks and show that the system supports several families of synchronized clustered solutions. One of these families is characterized by consecutive oscillators belonging to distinct clusters, called alternate ordering, with two classes of solutions. The first consists of one or two static clusters, that lock on phases that depend on the coupling parameters, despite the non-zero natural oscillation frequency. The second one is comprised of clusters that rotate rigidly. The number of clusters depends on the neighbor connectivity. We also investigated sequential ordered clusters and showed that the constraints imposed by the interface oscillators imposes additional restrictions to equilibrium configurations. Although some of these solutions are stable, their basins of attraction depend on model parameters: when the system is initialized with random phases, the oscillators tend to organize themselves into dynamical clusters whose interfaces move along the ring. The oscillators within each cluster remain close to one of the stable phase configurations, while particles are exchanged at the interfaces. When interfaces moving in opposite directions collide, the corresponding clusters annihilate, until a state with interfaces moving in a common direction is reached.

Third-order dispersion turns the soliton of the nonlinear Schrödinger equation, which underlies optical analogues of event horizons in fibers, into a weakly radiating solitary wave. We compute three of its properties without assuming a thermal emission law. First, the linearized (Bogoliubov-de Gennes) problem must be posed about the stationary state of the dispersive equation: linearizing about the integrable profile produces a complex quartet that is converged in grid and box, grows as the square root of the dispersion strength and is spurious. About the stationary state, on a periodic grid, the zero-mode sector consists of two Jordan blocks of size two and the spectrum is real at the operating point, including negative-energy box modes of the resonant branch. Second, we measure the steady Cherenkov emission of adiabatically prepared solitons from the flux of the radiation behind them, over eight decades. The radiation is phase-matched in the frame of the drifting soliton, and the first-order rate falls short of the measured one by factors of 29 to 45. Expressed through a scaled dispersion coefficient of the local soliton, the measured rate describes launched solitons of three amplitudes; with norm and momentum balance, and no further fitted parameter, it reproduces their recoil and the slow decay of their loss rate; at weak dispersion the loss of a launched soliton is the shedding of its launch mismatch. Third, a census of the asymptotic channels shows that long-wavelength upstream emission requires the chemical potential of the soliton, lowered by the comoving-frame Doppler shift of a drifting soliton, to lie inside the analysis band, which bounds the soliton amplitude. In a kinematic model of the flow the surface gravity has a closed form; the thermal relation and the entanglement built on it are imposed inputs of that model. The construction applies to Raman-free Kerr media.

The Davey-Stewartson (DS) system is a canonical model for a weakly nonlinear wave packet in two spatial dimensions that is resonantly coupled to the slowly varying mean flow it generates, and as such it governs modulated wave trains in settings as different as finite-depth water waves, quadratic optical media and magnetic films. Here we develop the Whitham modulation theory for the DS system and use it to study the stability of its periodic traveling wave solutions. Specifically: 1. We perform a detailed study of the parametric dependence of the periodic solutions of all four variants of the DS system, including their harmonic and soliton limits. 2. We present the formulation of Whitham modulation theory for the DS system and write down the resulting Whitham modulation equations for all four variants of the DS system. 3. We use the resulting modulation equations to study the stability of the periodic traveling wave solutions of all four variants of the DS system. 4. We validate the theoretical predictions by comparing them with a direct linearization of the DS system as well as with the direct numerical simulations of the DS system, showing excellent agreement. The results indicate that the periodic solutions of the defocusing DSII system are linearly stable, whereas those of all other variants of the DS system are unstable. The calculations also evidence many structural features (non-evolutionary modulation equations, constraints on the admissible initial data, and auxiliary mean-field constants absent from the traveling wave solutions yet indispensable to the modulation system) are expected to recur in any two-dimensional envelope equation with mean-field coupling.

We investigate soliton formation and interactions in the non-integrable Gardner-Ostrovsky equation (alias the rotation-modified Gardner equation) with anomalous (positive) dispersion. This equation is relevant to the description of wave dynamics in plasmas and other dispersive media. We show that a special class of solitons, characterized by zero total mass and non-monotonic asymptotics, can emerge from pulse-like initial perturbations. Depending on the initial conditions, these solitons may form regular amplitude-ordered trains, irregular nonstationary ensembles of interacting localized structures, or stationary propagating multi-soliton complexes. We further demonstrate that soliton interactions in the Gardner-Ostrovsky equation are inherently inelastic, leading to the emergence of a dominant "soliton-champion" in closed systems. For example, under periodic boundary conditions, only the largest-amplitude soliton ultimately survives, while all smaller solitons are gradually eliminated through successive interactions. Despite their inelastic interactions, Gardner-Ostrovsky solitons exhibit remarkable robustness.

We discuss surface-pinned, topologically charged, nonsingular defects (SD) in light scattering by a plasmonic object. They follow from exact Maxwell boundary conditions and are purely topological—unaffected by surface forces. At optical frequencies, in (quasi) 2D, they appear in the electric and Poynting vector fields for $H^{(z)}$ polarization, not for $E^{(z)}$. Exact solutions for a circular cylinder reveal topological charge-conserving bifurcations involving SDs with bulk singularities or SDs alone, and contraction of defect regions under loss.

Nonlinearity can induce topological phase transitions in periodic systems. It is hence of considerable interest to examine if such transitions persist in the absence of translational symmetry. We address this question directly in real space, using the periodic Su-Schrieffer-Heeger (SSH) chain as a reference for understanding the effect of quasiperiodicity. How nonlinearity drives a chain towards a topological phase transition is found to depend strongly on the strength of the quasiperiodic potential. As the nonlinearity strength increases, we find that weak quasiperiodicity supports a transition from a trivial to a topological phase, whereas the intermediate regime does not have a topological phase transition. Under strong quasiperiodicity, pronounced boundary localization can develop well before a nonlinearity-induced topological transition. Our results show how nonlinearity may interplay with a quasiperiodic potential in inducing topological phase transitions and that boundary localization of nonlinear eigenstates alone may not be taken as a clear signature of topological edge states.

Harnessing integrability at arbitrary interaction strength, we build long-lived and spatially localized soliton-like excitations in the 1D Bose gas with contact repulsion (Lieb-Liniger model). We show how these density profiles, built from selective superpositions of multi-hole eigenstates, display long lifetimes tunable through parameters like dispersion width and number of holes. We further illustrate a scaling protocol that in principle enables unbounded increase in lifetimes in the thermodynamic limit. Our results showcase classical-like excitations originating from unitary quantum dynamics, away from the semi-classical regime, and in regions where interactions cannot be treated perturbatively.

Inferring an Allen-Cahn constitutive force from images requires more than an accurate optimizer: nonlinear observation noise alters the mean of force features, shared noise couples instruments to the response, and a temporal balance borrowed from another solver can remain biased even on clean data. We develop observation-aware, noise-adjusted moment equations that address these effects before inversion. The surface-tension-calibrated constitutive transformer (SCCT) couples the resulting moments to a positive Bernstein inverse and can adapt its prior and precision from images and moments. A conditional stability bound separates moment residuals from prior error. Synthetic tests show that correcting the estimating equation matters more than increasing regularizer flexibility; the benefit of learned adaptation is smaller and depends on the training comparison. Forces inferred from planar movies predict unseen planar and three-dimensional evolutions. A ring-cage breakup shows why diffuse-interface accuracy distinguishes forces even when their topological predictions agree, while external surface tension sets the energy scale separately.

External potentials break the translational invariance of nonlinear Schrödinger (NLS) equations and generally convert a continuous family of standing wave solutions into isolated pinned states. We study this mechanism for the prototypical case of a kink in the NLS equation with competing focusing cubic and defocusing quintic nonlinearities. The Lyapunov–Schmidt reduction method is used to prove that the location $s_0$ of the pinned kinks is selected near roots of an effective potential $V_{\rm eff}(s)$. We then determine how the translational zero eigenvalue of the Jacobian operator splits under the perturbation and prove that the sign of $V_{\rm eff}'(s_0)$ distinguishes eigendirections of positive and negative energy. We further show that if the Jacobian operator admits a negative eigenvalue, then the stability problem contains a real unstable eigenvalue. The derivation of the asymptotic expansion for the unstable eigenvalue is nonstandard because the zero eigenvalue is embedded in the continuous spectrum of the linearized operator. Finally, we show that the persistence of kinks lacks parity symmetry even if the external potential is odd. Numerical continuation, spectral computations with domains adapted to the slowly decaying eigenfunctions, and direct dynamical simulations of the time evolution corroborate the analytical predictions for different representative examples.

We model directed motion of cells that aggregate into a cluster in the presence of chemotaxis or fluid transport. Starting from a stochastic agent-based model (ABM) of Galante & Levy (2013), Chavy-Waddy & Kolokolnikov (2016), we consider two model variants, with (I) directed motion of individuals, or (II) implicit individual bias in one direction. In both cases, we derive fourth order nonlinear PDEs representing the continuum limits of the models as a generalization of Chavy-Waddy & Kolokolnikov (2016). An exact analytic solution then describes cluster density profile as well as the group velocity, and we identify the regimes where the travelling cluster exists. Excellent agreement is observed between the discrete models and the exact solutions of the PDEs in both models, including the existence and speed of the travelling cluster.

Selective advantage leads to the proliferation of a species into an ecosystem. On the other hand, self-propulsion can lead to dynamic clustering of individuals. To analyze the intricate effects produced by such competing processes, we introduce a minimal model for a proliferating active population, where run-and-tumble migration is combined with a stochastic birth-death process. Beginning with the microscopic dynamics of the particles, we derive the corresponding hydrodynamic equations and validate them through numerical simulations. We demonstrate that the inclusion of activity leads to the emergence of novel morphological patterns, which are sensitive to the specific rules governing migration. Furthermore, we show that activity significantly alters the characteristics of invasion waves, increasing their propagation speed. However, beyond a threshold, excessive activity disrupts the wave-like nature of the invasion process. We also extend our study to two dimensions and analyze the instabilities that lead to pattern formation in such systems.

We study the focusing one-dimensional cubic nonlinear Schrödinger / Gross–Pitaevskii equation (NLS-GP), where the potential of the underlying linear Schrödinger operator, $H_V=-\partial_x^2+V(x)$, is compactly supported. In \cite{turner2026resonance} the authors proved that purely imaginary zeros (transmission resonances) or purely imaginary poles in the lower half plane (scattering resonances) of a reflection coefficient of $H_V$ seed branches of resonance-induced nonlinear bound states, and that these states bifurcate at a strictly positive $L^2(\mathbb R)$ excitation threshold. This is in contrast to nonlinear bound states which bifurcate at zero $L^2$-norm from point spectra of $H_V$ (corresponding to poles in the upper half plane). In this paper we establish precise criteria for the nonlinear orbital stability and instability of the resonance-induced states near the bifurcation point. A corollary is that resonance-induced nonlinear states are orbitally stable if i) the underlying linear (scattering or transmission) resonance frequency is sufficiently small, and ii) the corresponding linear resonance eigenmode is strictly positive. Numerical simulations are presented to explore regimes not accessible to our theory, and to explore the large time dynamics for initial conditions near stable and unstable resonance-induced nonlinear bound states.

We investigate how root allometry and below-ground root competition due to root overlap affect the conditions for pattern formation in non-local scalar vegetation models. We start from a spatially explicit two-component vegetation-water system in which plants acquire soil water through their laterally extended root systems, with root allometry represented by an interaction kernel whose spatial extent increases with the above-ground biomass density. In the limit of fast water dynamics, we eliminate the water variable, resulting in a non-local scalar model for the vegetation dynamics. This reduction reveals that accounting for root overlap naturally leads to a double integral structure in the scalar model, in contrast to the single convolution term commonly used to model non-local competition for resources. For the resulting scalar model, we identify two distinct mechanisms that can drive Turing instabilities. The first instability mechanism requires root growth to outpace mortality, while the second mechanism relies on the development of competitive pressure zones, in which vegetation growth is impeded by the cumulative competitive pressure exerted by neighbouring areas with higher biomass density. Root allometry promotes the occurrence of both instability mechanisms, while root overlap inhibits the emergence of competitive pressure zones. Hence, our results show that both root allometry and root overlap are important features to consider when studying vegetation pattern formation.

We demonstrate that two-component photonic nonlinear lattices with opposite signs of the out-of-phase spatially modulated SPM and XPM coefficients can support two types of optical vector solitons (VSs), the fundamental and mixed ones. The fundamental VSs are composed of two Gaussian-like components, while the mixed ones combine Gaussian-like and dipole components. The structures and stability of both types of the VSs are investigated. The VSs are stable, except for narrow intervals at small values of the propagation constant.

Branching fundamentally modifies nonlinear localization by introducing vertex degrees of freedom absent in one-dimensional lattices. We investigate localized states in a PT-symmetric four-edge star graph described by the discrete nonlinear Schrödinger equation. We identify a discrete vortex state with a fixed topological charge, supported by the branching geometry. Constructed by continuation from the anticontinuum limit, the vortex evolves into a current-carrying state in the presence of balanced gain and loss and exhibits stability windows absent for the conventional branches. A possible electric-circuit realization of the proposed model is discussed.

We introduce a conservative two-exponent dispersive family, with $p>1$ the nonlinear-flux exponent and $r>0$ the gradient-dispersion exponent, that separates the mechanisms governing compactification, free-boundary regularity and linearised spectral structure while retaining an explicit travelling-wave theory. The family reduces to the absolute Rosenau-Hyman equation when $r=1$. The deformation leaves the amplitude-speed law unchanged, but makes the width amplitude dependent except at $r=1$. Two independent transition curves emerge: $pr=1$ separates infinite-tail solitary waves from compactons, whereas $r(p-1)=2$ separates compactons with a regular free boundary from edge-cusped compactons with divergent slope. The latter remain distributional solutions, with no singular measures at either the free boundary or the crest. For $r\ge1$, the linearisation factors through a singular Sturm-Liouville operator whose natural Friedrichs realisation is solvable: after a compacton-adapted change of variable, the eigenvalue equation is of Jacobi-hypergeometric type, with two explicit spectral sequences, exactly one negative eigenvalue and a one-dimensional translation kernel. Numerical experiments connect these exact structures to approximation and dynamics. Measured Fourier tails and projection errors agree with the rates predicted by the free-boundary exponent, while padded Fourier-Galerkin time integration propagates the cusped waves coherently with small phase drift. A structure-adapted Jacobi-Galerkin diagnostic of the full generator finds no detectable real part in the tested truncated point spectra. The family therefore provides an explicit testbed in which geometric singularity, weak admissibility, spectral structure and numerical regularity of compactons can be studied within a single degenerate dispersive model.

The familiar wave kinetic theory revolves around turbulent energy cascades characterized by random phases of the individual normal modes. By contrast, recent years have revealed turbulent cascades where the transfer of energy is mediated by phase-coherent dynamics. Such coherent cascades have been previously established in deterministic systems with a tightly controlled algebraic structure of the mode interactions, such as nonlinear Schrödinger equations. Here, we show that the presence of phase-coherent cascades is robust with respect to substantial alterations of the mode couplings. We prove that, in infinite-dimensional resonant Hamiltonian systems with fully resonant normal mode spectra and random nonlinear couplings, a structured subset of couplings — an infinitesimal fraction of the total — suffices to support coherent cascades characterized by phase alignment, the formation of power-law spectra, and either unbounded growth of Sobolev norms or a finite-time blow-up. Numerical simulations further demonstrate the emergence of coherent cascades from random initial data through a process of phase locking, suggesting a mechanism for their emergence in broader classes of initial data and systems. We thus show that disordered mode interactions can sustain, rather than block, coherent energy transport across arbitrarily distant scales.

We demonstrate the generation of near-visible, broadband Kerr frequency combs using a tapered fibre Fabry-Pérot resonator. By incorporating micron-diameter tapered silica fibre into a pulsed-driven Fabry-Pérot configuration, we exploit geometric dispersion engineering to overcome the strong normal dispersion intrinsic to silica (and nearly all materials) at short wavelengths, achieving net anomalous dispersion in the near-visible regime. The strong mode confinement of the tapered fibre simultaneously enhances the Kerr nonlinearity by over an order of magnitude relative to standard fibre, substantially reducing the threshold drive power for nonlinear structure formation. Through precise control of the cavity fabrication, we experimentally demonstrate and numerically confirm a rich suite of coherent, phase-locked nonlinear structures, including conventional anomalous dispersion cavity solitons, zero dispersion solitons with spectral bandwidths exceeding 16 THz between 750 nm and 800 nm, as well as switching wave combs and broadband Raman solitons, the latter also reported here for the first time in the near-visible regime. Our results establish the tapered fibre Fabry-Pérot resonator as a versatile platform for near-visible and potentially visible coherent frequency comb generation.

Traveling waves of activity in neural tissue can be halted by spatial inhomogeneity in synaptic coupling. We study an integrate-and-fire network in which each neuron fires once and the coupling decays exponentially. For this model the leading-edge firing map reduces exactly to a scalar equation for the wave speed in space, with a slow unstable and a fast stable homogeneous speed, $c_1$ and $c_2$, and a periodic modulation of the coupling enters this equation pointwise. Positive periodic waves terminate in folds. For slowly varying modulation the fold amplitude approaches a plateau set by the trough of the modulation, where the local bottleneck speed is $\sqrt{c_1 c_2}$; the approach to the plateau is set by the local geometry of the trough. For rapidly varying modulation the fold amplitude grows linearly with frequency, with a slope given by a full-amplitude average over the integrated modulation profile; a weak-ripple truncation of that average overestimates the slope about 2.5-fold at the default coupling. A perturbative recursion in the amplitude gives the speed profile explicitly. We distinguish loss of the periodic wave from failure of a particular launch, and the excitatory regime $\epsilon\le 1$ from its sign-changing extension. The results are checked against direct integration of the reduced equation and first-spike firing-map simulations of the network.

The sudden removal of a potential barrier from a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) gives rise to a quantum version of a hydrodynamic dam break and leads to rich wave dynamics that have similarities to other localized defect problems such as domain wall dynamics in spin systems. Denoting $\Delta n$ as the initial difference in density between the upper $n_{1}$ and lower $n_{0}$ reservoirs on either side of the dam, we use the Gross-Pitaevskii equation to study the quasi-one dimensional case in both perturbative ($\Delta n \ll n_{0}$) and non-perturbative ($\Delta n \sim n_{1}$) regimes. In the perturbative regime a pair of outwardly propagating dispersive wavepackets forms which can be viewed as quantum versions of undular tidal bores that have analytic forms at long times in terms of the integrals of Airy functions with a wavelength that grows as $(\hbar^2 t)^{1/3}$. Airy functions are the universal wave functions that dress structurally stable fold caustics where pairs of rays coalesce, and, indeed, we show that the quantum dam break problem has the same ray structure as the naturally occurring caustic phenomenon of a double rainbow, including Alexander's dark band between the two bows where no light is scattered: we identify the intermediate density plateau in the dam break as an analogous `silent band' where only evanescent sound waves can exist. In the opposite regime of a non-perturbative dam break we show that a self-induced sonic horizon occurs when $\Delta n \geq (8/9)n_{1}$. A discussion of possible experimental schemes for amplification of quantum undulations is included as well as an alternative scheme for dispersive wave generation where a constant flow is imprinted on a BEC in box trap.