PT-symmetric dimer of coupled nonlinear oscillators

We provide a systematic analysis of a prototypical nonlinear oscillator system respecting PT symmetry i.e., one of them has gain and the other an equal and opposite amount of loss. Starting from the linear limit of the system, we extend considerations to the nonlinear case for both soft and hard cubic nonlinearities identifying symmetric and antisymmetric breather solutions, as well as symmetry-breaking variants thereof. We propose a reduction of the system to a Schrodinger-type PT-symmetric dimer, whose detailed earlier understanding can explain many of the phenomena observed herein, including the PT phase transition. Nevertheless, there are also significant parametric as well as phenomenological potential differences between the two models and we discuss where these arise and where they are most pronounced. Finally, we also provide examples of the evolution dynamics of the different states in their regimes of instability.