Short-lived two-soliton bound states in weakly perturbed nonlinear Schrodinger equation.

Resonant soliton collisions in the weakly discrete nonlinear Schrodinger equation are studied numerically. The fractal nature of the soliton scattering, described in our previous works, is investigated in detail. We demonstrate that the fractal scattering pattern is related to the existence of the short-lived two-soliton bound states. The bound state can be regarded as a two-soliton quasiparticle of a new type, different from the breather. We establish that the probability P of a bound state with the lifetime L follows the law P approximately L(-3). In the frame of a simple two-particle model, we derive the nonlinear map, which generates the fractal pattern similar to that observed in the numerical study of soliton collisions. (c) 2002 American Institute of Physics.