The Three-Waveguide Soliton Coupler

Abstract

The numerical demonstration of spatial multisoliton emission from a nonlinear waveguide [1] immediately opened new possibilities for the design of nonlinear optical devices. Two of these are particularly notable: the soliton coupler [2] and the soliton scanner [3]. The former, designed with the help of the equivalent-particle theory [2],[4], performs exchange of energy between two waveguides by transfer of solitons. The scanner, on the other hand, makes use of a tapered nonlinear slab which terminates in a nonlinear medium. A spatial soliton excited in the thinner (output) end can follow different routes depending on the power and relative phase of a TE1 beam which is added as a probe to the main TE0 input mode.