Progresses on Some Open Problems Related to Infinitely Many Symmetries

The quest to reveal the physical essence of the infinitely many symmetries and/or conservation laws that are intrinsic to integrable systems has historically posed a significant challenge at the confluence of physics and mathematics. This scholarly investigation delves into five open problems related to these boundless symmetries within integrable systems by scrutinizing their multi-wave solutions, employing a fresh analytical methodology. For a specified integrable system, there exist various categories of n -wave solutions, such as the n -soliton solutions, multiple breathers, complexitons, and the n -periodic wave solutions (the algebro-geometric solutions with genus n ), wherein n denotes an arbitrary integer that can potentially approach infinity. Each subwave comprising the n -wave solution may possess free parameters, including center parameters c i , width parameters (wave number) k i , and periodic parameters (the Riemann parameters) m i . It is evident that these solutions are translation invariant with respect to all these free parameters. We postulate that the entirety of the recognized infinitely many symmetries merely constitute linear combinations of these finite wave parameter translation symmetries. This conjecture appears to hold true for all integrable systems with n -wave solutions. The conjecture intimates that the currently known infinitely many symmetries is not exhaustive, and an indeterminate number of symmetries remain to be discovered. This conjecture further indicates that by imposing an infinite array of symmetry constraints, it becomes feasible to derive exact multi-wave solutions. By considering the renowned Korteweg–de Vries (KdV) equation and the Burgers equation as simple examples, the conjecture is substantiated for the n -soliton solutions. It is unequivocal that any linear combination of the wave parameter translation symmetries retains its status as a symmetry associated with the particular solution. This observation suggests that by introducing a ren-variable and a ren-symmetric derivative, which serve as generalizations of the Grassmann variable and the super derivative, it may be feasible to unify classical integrable systems, supersymmetric integrable systems, and ren-symmetric integrable systems within a cohesive hierarchical framework. Notably, a ren-symmetric integrable Burgers hierarchy is explicitly derived. Both the supersymmetric and the classical integrable hierarchies are encompassed within the ren-symmetric integrable hierarchy. The results of this paper will make further progresses in nonlinear science: to find more infinitely many symmetries, to establish novel methods to solve nonlinear systems via symmetries, to find more novel exact solutions and new physics, and to open novel integrable theories such as the ren-symmetric integrable systems and the possible relations to fractional integrable systems.