IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v6y2015i1d10.1038_ncomms8782.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Observation of optical solitons in PT-symmetric lattices

Author

Listed:
  • Martin Wimmer

    (Institute of Optics, Information and Photonics, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg
    Erlangen Graduate School in Advanced Optical Technologies (SAOT))

  • Alois Regensburger

    (Institute of Optics, Information and Photonics, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg)

  • Mohammad-Ali Miri

    (CREOL, College of Optics and Photonics, University of Central Florida)

  • Christoph Bersch

    (Institute of Optics, Information and Photonics, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg)

  • Demetrios N. Christodoulides

    (CREOL, College of Optics and Photonics, University of Central Florida)

  • Ulf Peschel

    (Institute of Solid State Theory and Optics, Friedrich Schiller University Jena)

Abstract

Controlling light transport in nonlinear active environments is a topic of considerable interest in the field of optics. In such complex arrangements, of particular importance is to devise strategies to subdue chaotic behaviour even in the presence of gain/loss and nonlinearity, which often assume adversarial roles. Quite recently, notions of parity-time (PT) symmetry have been suggested in photonic settings as a means to enforce stable energy flow in platforms that simultaneously employ both amplification and attenuation. Here we report the experimental observation of optical solitons in PT-symmetric lattices. Unlike other non-conservative nonlinear arrangements where self-trapped states appear as fixed points in the parameter space of the governing equations, discrete PT solitons form a continuous parametric family of solutions. The possibility of synthesizing PT-symmetric saturable absorbers, where a nonlinear wave finds a lossless path through an otherwise absorptive system is also demonstrated.

Suggested Citation

  • Martin Wimmer & Alois Regensburger & Mohammad-Ali Miri & Christoph Bersch & Demetrios N. Christodoulides & Ulf Peschel, 2015. "Observation of optical solitons in PT-symmetric lattices," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 6(1), pages 1-9, November.
  • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:6:y:2015:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms8782
    DOI: 10.1038/ncomms8782
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms8782
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/ncomms8782?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Qi Zhong & Fan O. Wu & Absar U. Hassan & Ramy El-Ganainy & Demetrios N. Christodoulides, 2023. "Universality of light thermalization in multimoded nonlinear optical systems," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-7, December.
    2. Zhongming Gu & He Gao & Haoran Xue & Jensen Li & Zhongqing Su & Jie Zhu, 2022. "Transient non-Hermitian skin effect," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-7, December.
    3. Wu, Zhenkun & Yang, Kaibo & Ren, Xijun & Li, Peng & Wen, Feng & Gu, Yuzong & Guo, Lijun, 2022. "Conical diffraction modulation in fractional dimensions with a PT-symmetric potential," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 164(C).
    4. Zhu, Xing & Xiang, Dan & Zeng, Liangwei, 2023. "Fundamental and multipole gap solitons in spin-orbit-coupled Bose-Einstein condensates with parity-time-symmetric Zeeman lattices," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:6:y:2015:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms8782. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.