Abstract

Partial annihilation of two counterpropagating dissipative solitons, with only one pulse surviving the collision, has been widely observed in different experimental contexts, over a large range of parameters, from hydrodynamics to chemical reactions. However, a generic picture accounting for partial annihilation is missing. Based on our results for coupled complex cubic-quintic Ginzburg-Landau equations as well as for the FitzHugh-Nagumo equation we conjecture that noise induces partial annihilation of colliding dissipative solitons in many systems. © 2009 The American Physical Society.