Laplacian growth and Whitham equations of soliton theory

The Laplacian growth (the Hele-Shaw problem) of multiply-connected domains in the case of zero surface tension is proven to be equivalent to an integrable system of Whitham equations known in soliton theory. The Whitham equations describe slowly modulated periodic solutions of integrable hierarchies of nonlinear differential equations. Through this connection the Laplacian,growth is understood as a flow in the moduli space of Riemann surfaces. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.