Singularity formation and blowup of complex-valued solutions of the modified KdV equation (Q379619)

Starting with explicit two-soliton solutions of the modified KdV equation \(u_t+6u^2u_x +u_{xxx}=0\), the authors establish that the singularities of these solutions are all simple poles and, excluding some exceptional cases, they all trace out analytic curves in the complex plane, as a function of time. It is shown that, in general, the poles of the two-soliton solutions separate out, for large time, positive or negative, into two sets of poles, each of which behaves asymptotically like the poles of a one-soliton solution with the appropriate speed. In the exceptional cases just mentioned, the singularities merge together. The analysis of these cases is shown to imply that there exist complex-valued solutions to the equation on the real line which blow up in finite time.