Optimum design of NOLM-driven mode-locked fiber lasers.

Most of the saturable absorbers commonly used to perform mode locking in laser cavities affect the trigger conditions of laser oscillation, which requires manually forcing the laser start-up by various means such as polarization controllers. We present a procedure for designing a laser cavity driven by a nonlinear optical loop mirror, which allows the laser to operate optimally without interfering with the oscillation triggering conditions, thus opening up possibilities for integration of this type of laser.

Optical soliton molecular complexes in a passively mode-locked fibre laser.

Ultrashort optical pulses propagating in a dissipative nonlinear system can interact and bind stably, forming optical soliton molecules. Soliton molecules in ultrafast lasers are under intense research focus and present striking analogies with their matter molecules counterparts. The recent development of real-time spectral measurements allows probing the internal dynamics of an optical soliton molecule, mapping the dynamics of the pulses' relative separations and phases that constitute the relevant internal degrees of freedom of the molecule. The soliton-pair molecule, which consists of two strongly bound optical solitons, has been the most studied multi-soliton structure. We here demonstrate that two soliton-pair molecules can bind subsequently to form a stable molecular complex and highlight the important differences between the intra-molecular and inter-molecular bonds. The dynamics of the experimentally observed soliton molecular complexes are discussed with the help of fitting models and numerical simulations, showing the universality of these multi-soliton optical patterns.

Suppression of the frequency drift of modulational instability sidebands by means of a fiber system associated with a photon reservoir.

We analyze fiber systems where the linear losses act as a strong perturbation, causing a frequency drift of the modulational instability sidebands. We achieve the total suppression of this frequency drift by means of a technique based on the concept of a photon reservoir, which feeds in situ the process of modulational instability by continually supplying it the amount of photons absorbed by the fiber.

Stationary and pulsating dissipative light bullets from a collective variable approach.

A collective variable approach is used to map domains of existence for (3+1)-dimensional spatiotemporal soliton solutions of a complex cubic-quintic Ginzburg-Landau equation. A rich variety of evolution behaviors, which include stationary and pulsating dissipative soliton dynamics, is revealed. Comparisons between the results obtained by the semianalytical approach of collective variables, and those obtained by a purely numerical approach show good agreement for a wide range of equation parameters. This also demonstrates the relevance of the semianalytical method for a systematic search of stability domains for spatiotemporal solitons, leading to a dramatic reduction of the computation time.

Cutoff solitons and bistability of the discrete inductance-capacitance electrical line: theory and experiments.

A discrete nonlinear system driven at one end by a periodic excitation of frequency above the upper band edge (the discreteness induced cutoff) is shown to be a means to (1) generate propagating breather excitations in a long chain and (2) reveal the bistable property of a short chain. After detailed numerical verifications, the bistability prediction is demonstrated experimentally on an electrical transmission line made of 18 inductance-capacitance (LC) cells. The numerical simulations of the LC -line model allow us also to verify the breather generation prediction with a striking accuracy.

Suppression of sideband frequency shifts in the modulational instability spectra of wave propagation in optical fiber systems.

In standard optical fibers with constant chromatic dispersion, modulational instability (MI) sidebands execute undesirable frequency shifts due to fiber losses. By means of a technique based on average-dispersion-decreasing dispersion-managed fibers, we achieve both complete suppression of the sideband frequency shifts and fine control of the MI frequencies, without any compromise in the MI power gain.

Experimental demonstration of 160-GHz densely dispersion-managed soliton transmission in a single channel over 896 km of commercial fibers.

We experimentally demonstrate the first 160-GHz densely dispersion-managed soliton transmission in a single channel at 1550 nm over nearly 900 km using commercially available non-zero dispersionshifted fibers. This performance has been achieved by using a 16 km-long recirculating loop configuration and an appropriate design of the dispersion map.

Strong reduction of optimum pump power for efficient wave conversion in optical fibers with dual-frequency circularly polarized pump waves.

We present experiments that show achievement of highly efficient generation of parametric sidebands in an optical fiber with dual-frequency, circularly polarized pump waves. An appropriate choice of the separation between the pump frequencies permits a strong reduction of the optimum power for highly efficient frequency conversion.

Suppression of soliton self-frequency shift by upshifted filtering.

We consider the effects of stimulated Raman scattering on ultrashort light pulses propagating in long-haul fiber transmission lines. We propose an efficient method for suppressing the soliton self-frequency shift by use of upshifted filters without any compromise in signal-to-noise ratio and with the pulse stability preserved.

Collective variable theory for optical solitons in fibers.

We present a projection-operator method to express the generalized nonlinear Schrödinger equation for pulse propagation in optical fibers, in terms of the pulse parameters, called collective variables, such as the pulse width, amplitude, chirp, and frequency. The collective variable (CV) equations of motion are derived by imposing a set of constraints on the CVs to minimize the soliton dressing during its propagation. The lowest-order approximation of this CV approach is shown to be equivalent to the variational Lagrangian method. Finally, we demonstrate the application of this CV theory for pulse propagation in dispersion-managed optical fiber links.

Analytical method for designing dispersion-managed fiber systems.

Using the equations of motion of pulse width and chirp, we present an analytical method for designing dispersion-managed (DM) fiber systems without optical losses. We show that the initial Gaussian pulse considered for the analytical design of periodically amplified DM fiber systems with losses will propagate as a proximity fixed point. Then averaging the DM soliton fields obtained from the slow dynamics of the proximity fixed point will yield the exact fixed point.

Motion of compactonlike kinks.

We analyze the ability of a compactonlike kink (i.e., kink with compact support) to execute a stable ballistic propagation in a discrete Klein-Gordon system with anharmonic coupling. We demonstrate that the effects of lattice discreteness, and the presence of a linear coupling between lattice sites, are detrimental to a stable ballistic propagation of the compacton, because of the particular structure of the small-oscillation frequency spectrum of the compacton in which the lower-frequency internal modes enter in direct resonance with phonon modes. Our study reveals the parameter regions for obtaining a stable ballistic propagation of a compactonlike kink. Finally we investigate the interactions between compactonlike kinks.

Influence of parametric four-wave mixing effects on stimulated Raman scattering in bimodal optical fibers.

We analyze stimulated Raman scattering in normally dispersive bimodal fibers under single-frequency pumping conditions. Experiments show that whenever the interacting nonlinear waves propagate in the LP(01) and LP(11) modes, a parametric four-wave mixing enters unavoidably into play in the wave-coupling behavior, which causes qualitatively different phenomena compared with the ordinary process of Raman scattering, such as the parametric suppression of the first-order Raman Stokes radiation.

Polarization switching of stimulated Raman scattering in optical fibers by dual-frequency pumping.

Experiments are presented showing that under dual-frequency, orthogonal-polarization pumping, stimulated Raman scattering in optical birefringent fibers can be suppressed in one of the two fiber axes. For relatively small-frequency spacing and group-velocity mismatch between the pumps, Stokes light is suppressed along the polarization direction of the highest-frequency pump, owing to the orthogonal component of the Raman gain.