Interactions between impurities and breather-pairs in a nonlinear lattice

Based on the Frenkel–Kontorova (FK) model with a δ-impurity, this Letter investigates the interactions between impurities and breather-pairs in a nonlinear pendulum chain driven by a vertical vibration. The numerical results show that a long impurity in pendulum length can absorb more energy into the chain and upgrade the energy level of the breather-pair, when the driving frequency is slight lower than that of parametric resonance of the perfect pendulums, while a short one plays a counteractive role. As the chain is driven at a higher frequency, the effect of impurities turns reverse, which shows a clear symmetry and equivalency between long and short impurities. The main results including the effect and the symmetry of impurities generalize the conclusion on the single breather to the breather-pair.