title: Soliton ratchets in sine-Gordon systems with additive inhomogeneities.
abstract: We investigate the ratchet dynamics of solitons of a sine-Gordon system with additive inhomogeneities. We show by means of a collective coordinate approach that the soliton moves like a particle in an effective potential which is a result of the inhomogeneities. Different degrees of freedom of the soliton are used as collective coordinates in order to study their influence on the motion of the soliton. The collective coordinates considered are the soliton position, its width and offset, and the height of the spikes that appear on the soliton. The results of the theory are compared with numerical simulations of the full system.
authors.affiliation: Physikalisches Institut, Universität Bayreuth, 95440 Bayreuth, Germany. Vera.Stehr@Uni-Bayreuth.de
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Stehr
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Müller
authors.forename: F G
authors.initials: FG
authors.lastname: Mertens
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bishop