skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

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

Journal Article · · Nature Communications
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms11332· OSTI ID:1258598
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [4];  [4];  [3];  [5]
  1. Univ. of Sydney, NSW (Australia); Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Center for Nanoscale Materials
  2. FOM Institute AMOLF, Science Park (Amsterdam); Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Center for Nanoscale Materials
  3. Univ. of Sydney, NSW (Australia)
  4. Thales Research and Technology, Palaiseau (France)
  5. 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.

Research Organization:
Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
OSTI ID:
1258598
Journal Information:
Nature Communications, Vol. 7; ISSN 2041-1723
Publisher:
Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 13 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (47)

Ionization-induced blueshift of high-peak-power guided-wave ultrashort laser pulses in hollow-core photonic-crystal fibers journal November 2007
Nonlinear propagation of ultrafast 1.5 μm pulses in high-index-contrast silicon-on-insulator waveguides journal February 2004
Controlling free-carrier temporal effects in silicon by dispersion engineering journal January 2014
Temporal solitons and pulse compression in photonic crystal waveguides journal November 2010
Time and frequency domain measurements of solitons in subwavelength silicon waveguides using a cross-correlation technique journal January 2010
Ultrafast nonlinear optics in gas-filled hollow-core photonic crystal fibers [Invited] journal January 2011
Soliton dynamics in the multiphoton plasma regime journal January 2013
Observation of soliton compression in silicon photonic crystals journal January 2014
Optical pulse propagation in nonlinear photonic crystals journal October 2001
Extrinsic Optical Scattering Loss in Photonic Crystal Waveguides: Role of Fabrication Disorder and Photon Group Velocity journal January 2005
Slow light enhancement of nonlinear effects in silicon engineered photonic crystal waveguides journal January 2009
Characterizing Pulse Propagation in Optical Fibers around 1550 nm Using Frequency-Resolved Optical Gating journal July 1998
Unravelling Nonlinear Spectral Evolution Using Nanoscale Photonic Near-Field Point-to-Point Measurements journal November 2013
Device-level characterization of the flow of light in integrated photonic circuits using ultrafast photomodulation spectroscopy journal November 2014
Tracking ultrashort pulses through dispersive media: Experiment and theory journal August 2003
Experimental Observation of Picosecond Pulse Narrowing and Solitons in Optical Fibers journal September 1980
Theory of the soliton self-frequency shift journal January 1986
Supercontinuum generation in photonic crystal fiber journal October 2006
Nonlinear pulse propagation in a monomode dielectric guide journal May 1987
B. Initial Value Problems of One-Dimensional Self-Modulation of Nonlinear Waves in Dispersive Media journal January 1974
Self-Compression of Ultrashort Pulses through Ionization-Induced Spatiotemporal Reshaping journal October 2004
Colloquium : Femtosecond optical frequency combs journal March 2003
Supercontinuum generation in silicon photonic wires journal January 2007
Low-threshold supercontinuum generation in highly nonlinear chalcogenide nanowires journal January 2008
Supercontinuum generation in a high index doped silica glass spiral waveguide journal January 2010
Dispersive wave emission and supercontinuum generation in a silicon wire waveguide pumped around the 1550  nm telecommunication wavelength journal January 2014
Midinfrared supercontinuum generation from 2 to 6  μm in a silicon nanowire journal January 2015
Soliton fission and supercontinuum generation in silicon waveguides journal January 2007
Wavelength-division-multiplexed Millimeter-waveband radio-on-fiber system using a supercontinuum light source journal January 2006
Detection and Spectroscopy of Gold Nanoparticles Using Supercontinuum White Light Confocal Microscopy journal July 2004
Mapping nanoscale light fields journal November 2014
Tracking Femtosecond Laser Pulses in Space and Time journal November 2001
Real-Space Observation of Ultraslow Light in Photonic Crystal Waveguides journal February 2005
Theory of Photoionization-Induced Blueshift of Ultrashort Solitons in Gas-Filled Hollow-Core Photonic Crystal Fibers journal November 2011
Measurement of femtosecond ionization dynamics of atmospheric density gases by spectral blueshifting journal December 1991
Experimental Evidence for Supercontinuum Generation by Fission of Higher-Order Solitons in Photonic Fibers journal April 2002
Ultrashort pulse propagation, pulse breakup, and fundamental soliton formation in a single-mode optical fiber journal November 1987
Nonlinear silicon photonics analyzed with the moment method journal January 2015
The effect of higher-order dispersion on slow light propagation in photonic crystal waveguides journal January 2006
Control of dispersion in photonic crystal waveguides using group symmetry theory journal January 2012
Nonlinear pulse propagation in the neighborhood of the zero-dispersion wavelength of monomode optical fibers journal January 1986
Fission of optical solitons induced by stimulated Raman effect journal January 1988
Accurate measurement of large optical frequency differences with a mode-locked laser journal January 1999
Visible continuum generation in air–silica microstructure optical fibers with anomalous dispersion at 800 nm journal January 2000
Submicrometer axial resolution optical coherence tomography journal January 2002
Octave-spanning mid-infrared supercontinuum generation in silicon nanowaveguides journal January 2014
Dispersive wave emission and supercontinuum generation in a silicon wire waveguide pumped around the 1550 nm telecommunication wavelength text January 2014

Cited By (6)

Bragg Soliton Compression and Fission on CMOS‐Compatible Ultra‐Silicon‐Rich Nitride journal July 2019
Photonic crystal waveguides based on wide-gap semiconductor alloys journal February 2017
On the analytical description of self-frequency shift of a pulse propagating in the region of zero group-velocity dispersion journal August 2017
Nonlinear gallium phosphide nanoscale photonics [Invited] journal January 2018
Real-time dynamics and cross-correlation gating spectroscopy of free-carrier Drude slow-light solitons journal February 2017
Physical origin of higher-order soliton fission in nanophotonic semiconductor waveguides journal November 2018

Similar Records

Physical origin of higher-order soliton fission in nanophotonic semiconductor waveguides
Journal Article · Wed Nov 21 00:00:00 EST 2018 · Scientific Reports · OSTI ID:1258598

Nonadiabatic dynamics of dark solitons
Journal Article · Tue Jul 01 00:00:00 EDT 1997 · Journal of the Optical Society of America, Part B: Optical Physics · OSTI ID:1258598

Group-velocity-dispersion engineering of tantala integrated photonics
Journal Article · Tue Feb 09 00:00:00 EST 2021 · Optics Letters · OSTI ID:1258598