A note on the modulational instability of long Alfvén waves parallel to the magnetic field

Abstract

An amplitude dependent criterion for modulational stability of long Alfvén waves parallel to the magnetic field is interpreted in terms of a recently obtained inverse scattering solution to the modified nonlinear Schrödinger equation. It is found that the solitons formed are of two types. In the strongly unstable case, normal solitons are formed. In the transition region of weakly unstable and stable cases, the anomalous type, which in a limiting case becomes the algebraic soliton, dominates. In the strongly stable case, no solitons are formed.