Variational existence theory for hydroelastic solitary waves : Une théorie variationnelle d'existence d'ondes solitaires hydroélastiques
This paper presents an existence theory for solitary waves at the interface between a thin ice sheet (modelled using the Cosserat theory of hyperelastic shells) and an ideal fluid (of finite depth and in irrotational motion) for sufficiently large values of a dimensionless parameter γ. We establish the existence of a minimiser of the wave energy E subject to the constraint I=2μ, where I is the hor