A finite Toda representation of the box-ball system with box capacity

A connection between the finite ultradiscrete Toda lattice and the box-ball system is extended to the case where each box has own capacity and a carrier has a capacity parameter depending on time. In order to consider this connection, new carrier rules "size limit for solitons" and "recovery of balls", and a concept "expansion map" are introduced. A particular solution to the extended system of a special case is also presented.Comment: 20 pages, 9 figure

The A^{(1)}_M automata related to crystals of symmetric tensors

A soliton cellular automaton associated with crystals of symmetric tensor representations of the quantum affine algebra U'_q(A^{(1)}_M) is introduced. It is a crystal theoretic formulation of the generalized box-ball system in which capacities of boxes and carriers are arbitrary and inhomogeneous. Scattering matrices of two solitons coincide with the combinatorial R matrices of U'_q(A^{(1)}_{M-1}). A piecewise linear evolution equation of the automaton is identified with an ultradiscrete limit of the nonautonomous discrete KP equation. A class of N soliton solutions is obtained through the ultradiscretization of soliton solutions of the latter.Comment: 45 pages, latex2e, 2 figure

A systematic method for constructing time discretizations of integrable lattice systems: local equations of motion

We propose a new method for discretizing the time variable in integrable lattice systems while maintaining the locality of the equations of motion. The method is based on the zero-curvature (Lax pair) representation and the lowest-order "conservation laws". In contrast to the pioneering work of Ablowitz and Ladik, our method allows the auxiliary dependent variables appearing in the stage of time discretization to be expressed locally in terms of the original dependent variables. The time-discretized lattice systems have the same set of conserved quantities and the same structures of the solutions as the continuous-time lattice systems; only the time evolution of the parameters in the solutions that correspond to the angle variables is discretized. The effectiveness of our method is illustrated using examples such as the Toda lattice, the Volterra lattice, the modified Volterra lattice, the Ablowitz-Ladik lattice (an integrable semi-discrete nonlinear Schroedinger system), and the lattice Heisenberg ferromagnet model. For the Volterra lattice and modified Volterra lattice, we also present their ultradiscrete analogues.Comment: 61 pages; (v2)(v3) many minor correction

Tropical Krichever construction for the non-periodic box and ball system

A solution for an initial value problem of the box and ball system is constructed from a solution of the periodic box and ball system. The construction is done through a specific limiting process based on the theory of tropical geometry. This method gives a tropical analogue of the Krichever construction, which is an algebro-geometric method to construct exact solutions to integrable systems, for the non-periodic system.Comment: 13 pages, 1 figur

Integrable structure of box-ball systems: crystal, Bethe ansatz, ultradiscretization and tropical geometry

The box-ball system is an integrable cellular automaton on one dimensional lattice. It arises from either quantum or classical integrable systems by the procedures called crystallization and ultradiscretization, respectively. The double origin of the integrability has endowed the box-ball system with a variety of aspects related to Yang-Baxter integrable models in statistical mechanics, crystal base theory in quantum groups, combinatorial Bethe ansatz, geometric crystals, classical theory of solitons, tau functions, inverse scattering method, action-angle variables and invariant tori in completely integrable systems, spectral curves, tropical geometry and so forth. In this review article, we demonstrate these integrable structures of the box-ball system and its generalizations based on the developments in the last two decades.Comment: 73 page