High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The wave equation is an important second-order linear partial differential equation for the description of waves – as they occur in physics – such as sound waves, light waves and water waves. It arises in fields like acoustics, electromagnetics, and fluid dynamics. Historically, the problem of a vibrating string such as that of a musical instrument was studied by Jean le Rond d`Alembert, Leonhard Euler, Daniel Bernoulli, and Joseph-Louis Lagrange.