On the role of nonlinearities in the Boussinesq-type wave equations

Longitudinal mechanical waves in biomembranes are described by a Boussinesq-type wave equation. It is shown that in this case the nonlinearities are of a different type compared with conventional models of solids. The governing equation analysed in this paper is the improved Heimburg-Jackson model with two dispersive terms. The soliton-type solutions of such a wave equation are found and analysed. The existence of solitons depends on the ratio of nonlinear terms and the width of solitons is governed by dispersive terms.