Oscillatory motion of a counterpropagating Kerr soliton dimer

Abstract

Counterpropagating (CP) solitons generated in high-Q microcavities not only offer useful dual-comb sources, but also provide a new platform to study soliton interactions. Here, we demonstrate and theoretically explain a manifestation of soliton trapping that occurs between CP solitons in a silica microcavity introducing a Kerr soliton dimer. In conventional soliton trapping, the group velocities of two solitons can be synchronized by a Kerr-effect-mediated interaction. The solitons can then copropagate with a fixed temporal delay. However, as shown here, when counterpumping a microcavity using slightly detuned pump frequencies and in the presence of backscattering, the group velocities of clockwise and counterclockwise solitons undergo periodic modulation instead of being locked to a constant velocity. Upon emission from the microcavity, the solitons feature a relative oscillatory motion around a locked average relative displacement with an amplitude that can be larger than the soliton pulse width. This relative motion introduces a sideband fine structure into the optical spectrum of the CP solitons. Our observation provides insights on coherently pumped soliton dimers in microcavities.

Self-switching Kerr oscillations of counter-propagating light in microresonators

“…This has been subject to much investigation [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10]. Microresonators can additionally exhibit oscillatory behaviours due to a variety of mechanisms such as thermal instabilities [11] or external forcing [12]. Here we present the first experimental observation of oscillatory antiphase switching between counter-propagating light beams in a passive Kerr resonator -whereby the two fields exchange dominance.…”

Frequency combs with multiple offsets in THz-rate microresonators

“…Soliton breather states in the damped and driven nonlinear Schrödinger (Lugiato-Lefever) equation have been known for a long time [13,14]. The recent resurgence in studies of their properties has happened primarily through the context of the frequency comb generation in microresonators [8][9][10][11][15][16][17][18][19][20]. What was particularly interesting for us to find and report here is Fig.…”

“…We report the coexisting stable soliton combs with different repetition rates, i.e., fast and slow solitons. The soliton instability happens via the oscillatory scenario leading to the formation of soliton breathers [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20]. The range of the breather existence is broad and happens on either side from the pump detuning interval supporting stable solitons.…”

微腔光梳重频调控与光谱应用

“…当δν P 较小(或为0 Hz)时, 背向散射会使得 两个方向孤子的重频锁定在一起 [107,113,114] . 此时, 如果 δν P 不为0 Hz, 两个方向输出的孤子在时域上会经历一 个频率为δν P 的周期性振荡 [114] . [115] .…”