Necessary Covariance Conditions for a One-Field Lax Pair

We study the covariance with respect to Darboux transformations of polynomial differential and difference operators with coefficients given by functions of one basic field. In the scalar (Abelian) case, the functional dependence is established by equating the Frechet differential (the first term of the Taylor series on the prolonged space) to the Darboux transform; a Lax pair for the Boussinesq equation is considered. For a pair of generalized Zakharov–Shabat problems (with differential and shift operators) with operator coefficients, we construct a set of integrable nonlinear equations together with explicit dressing formulas. Non-Abelian special functions are fixed as the fields of the covariant pairs. We introduce a difference Lax pair, a combined gauge-Darboux transformation, and solutions of the Nahm equations.