Nonlinear Spectroscopy and All-Optical Switching of Femtosecond Soliton Molecules

Abstract

The emergence of confined structures and pattern formation are exceptional manifestations of concurring nonlinear interactions found in a variety of physical, chemical and biological systems[1]. Optical solitons are a hallmark of extreme spatial or temporal confinement enabled by a variety of nonlinearities. Such particle-like structures can assemble in complex stable arrangements, forming "soliton molecules"[2,3]. Recent works revealed oscillatory internal motions of these bound states, akin to molecular vibrations[4-8]. These observations beg the question as to how far the "molecular" analogy reaches, whether further concepts from molecular spectroscopy apply in this scenario, and if such intra-molecular dynamics can be externally driven or manipulated. Here, we probe and control such ultrashort bound-states in an optical oscillator, utilizing real-time spectroscopy and time-dependent external perturbations. We introduce two-dimensional spectroscopy of the linear and nonlinear bound-state response and resolve anharmonicities in the soliton interaction leading to overtone and sub-harmonic generation. Employing a non-perturbative interaction, we demonstrate all-optical switching between distinct states with different binding separation, opening up novel schemes of ultrafast spectroscopy, optical logic operations and all-optical memory.

3 figures

References in corpus (2)

• Instabilities, breathers and rogue waves in optics
• Oscillations and interactions of dark and dark-bright solitons in Bose-Einstein condensates

Cited by in corpus (9)

• Experimental realisations of the fractional Schrödinger equation in the temporal domain
• On-demand harnessing of photonic soliton molecules
• Farey tree and devil's staircase of frequency-locked breathers in ultrafast lasers
• Stable high-dimensional weak-light soliton molecules and their active control
• Flat-floor bubbles, dark solitons, and vortices stabilized by inhomogeneous nonlinear media
• Two-photon imaging of soliton dynamics
• Bright Matter-Wave Bound Soliton Molecules in Spin-1 Bose-Einstein Condensates with Non-autonomous Nonlinearities
• Phase incoherent photonic molecules in V-shaped mode-locked VECSELs
• Breather molecular complexes in a passively mode-locked fibre laser