Rational solutions of the Boussinesq equation and applications to rogue waves

Abstract

We study rational solutions of the Boussinesq equation, which is a soliton equation solvable by the inverse scattering method. These rational solutions, which are algebraically decaying and depend on two arbitrary parameters, are expressed in terms of special polynomials that are derived through a bilinear equation, have a similar appearance to rogue-wave solutions of the focusing nonlinear Schr\"odinger (NLS) equation and have an interesting structure. Further rational solutions of the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili I (KPI) equation are derived in two ways, from rational solutions of the NLS equation and from rational solutions of the Boussinesq equation. It is shown that the two families of rational solutions of the KPI equation are fundamentally different.