Free-carrier-induced soliton fission unveiled by in situ measurements in nanophotonic waveguides

Husko, Chad; Wulf, Matthias; Lefrancois, Simon; Combrié, Sylvain; Lehoucq, Gaëlle; De Rossi, Alfredo; Eggleton, Benjamin J.; Kuipers, L.

doi:10.1038/ncomms11332

Free-carrier-induced soliton fission unveiled by in situ measurements in nanophotonic waveguides

Journal Article · Fri Apr 15 00:00:00 EDT 2016 · Nature Communications

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms11332· OSTI ID:1258598

Husko, Chad ^[1]; Wulf, Matthias ^[2]; Lefrancois, Simon ^[3]; Combrié, Sylvain ^[4]; Lehoucq, Gaëlle ^[4]; De Rossi, Alfredo ^[4]; Eggleton, Benjamin J. ^[3]; Kuipers, L. ^[5]

Univ. of Sydney, NSW (Australia); Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Center for Nanoscale Materials
FOM Institute AMOLF, Science Park (Amsterdam); Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Center for Nanoscale Materials
Univ. of Sydney, NSW (Australia)
Thales Research and Technology, Palaiseau (France)
FOM Institute AMOLF, Science Park (Amsterdam)

Solitons are localized waves formed by a balance of focusing and defocusing effects. These nonlinear waves exist in diverse forms of matter yet exhibit similar properties including stability, periodic recurrence and particle-like trajectories. One important property is soliton fission, a process by which an energetic higher-order soliton breaks apart due to dispersive or nonlinear perturbations. Here we demonstrate through both experiment and theory that nonlinear photocarrier generation can induce soliton fission. Using near-field measurements, we directly observe the nonlinear spatial and temporal evolution of optical pulses in situ in a nanophotonic semiconductor waveguide. We develop an analytic formalism describing the free-carrier dispersion (FCD) perturbation and show the experiment exceeds the minimum threshold by an order of magnitude. We confirm these observations with a numerical nonlinear Schrodinger equation model. Finally, these results provide a fundamental explanation and physical scaling of optical pulse evolution in free-carrier media and could enable improved supercontinuum sources in gas based and integrated semiconductor waveguides.

View Accepted Manuscript (DOE)

Research Organization:: Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE

OSTI ID:: 1258598

Journal Information:: Nature Communications, Journal Name: Nature Communications Vol. 7; ISSN 2041-1723

Publisher:: Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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