Kink Dynamics in the $\varphi^4$ Model with Extended Impurity

The $\varphi^4$ theory is widely used in many areas of physics, from cosmology and elementary particle physics to biophysics and condensed matter theory. Topological defects, or kinks, in this theory describe stable, solitary wave excitations. In practice, these excitations, as they propagate, necessarily interact with impurities or imperfections in the on-site potential. In this work, we focus on the effect of the length and strength of a rectangular impurity on the kink dynamics. It is found that the interaction of a kink with an extended impurity is qualitatively similar to the interaction with a well-studied point impurity described by the delta function, but significant quantitative differences are observed. The interaction of kinks with an extended impurity described by a rectangular function is studied numerically. All possible scenarios of kink dynamics are determined and described, taking into account resonance effects. The inelastic interaction of the kink with the repulsive impurity arises only at high initial kink velocities. The dependencies of the critical and resonant velocities of the kink on the impurity parameters are found. It is shown that the critical velocity of the repulsive impurity passage is proportional to the square root of the barrier area, as in the case of the sine-Gordon equation with an impurity. It is shown that the resonant interaction in the $\varphi^4$ model with an attracting extended impurity, as well as for the case of a point impurity, in contrast to the case of the sine-Gordon equation, is due to the fact that the kink interacts not only with the impurity mode, but also with the kink’s internal mode. It is found that the dependence of the kink final velocity on the initial one has a large number of resonant windows.