Eric Louvergneaux

Observation of extreme temporal events in CW-pumped supercontinuum

We study experimentally and numerically the temporal features of supercontinuum generated with a continuous-wave ytterbium-doped fiber laser. We show that the temporal output of the supercontinuum is characterized by strong and brief power fluctuations, i.e. so-called optical rogue waves. We demonstrate numerically that these rare and strong events that appear and disappear from nowhere result from solitonic collisions.

Control and removal of modulational instabilities in low-dispersion photonic crystal fiber cavities

Taking up to fourth-order dispersion effects into account, we show that fiber resonators become stable for a large intensity regime. The range of pump intensities leading to modulational instability becomes finite and controllable. Moreover, by computing analytically the thresholds and frequencies of these instabilities, we demonstrate the existence of a new unstable frequency at the primary threshold. This frequency exists for an arbitrary small but nonzero fourth-order dispersion coefficient. Numerical simulations for a low and flattened dispersion photonic crystal fiber resonator confirm analytical predictions and open the way to experimental implementation.

All-fiber tunable optical delay line

We present a tunable optical delay line based on the use of a single chirped fiber Bragg grating written into a standard single mode optical fiber. In the proposed scheme, the delay is induced through the Bragg grating differential group delay curve. This is achieved by launching orthogonally polarized optical pulses in both directions into the Bragg grating and by controlling its local birefringence. This bidirectional propagation allows to compensate the second-order dispersion. The setup is suitable to delay pulses with a spectral width just less than the grating reflection bandwidth, which is particularly useful in the context of forthcoming wavelength division multiplexing ultra-high bit rate lightwave systems. In this work, the performances of the setup are investigated using a pulsed laser delivering 6.3 ps Fourier transform limited pulses at 1548 nm. A maximum delay of 120 ps (about 20 times the pulse width) is reported experimentally.

Experimental evidence of dissipative spatial solitons in an optical passive Kerr cavity

We report on the first experimental evidence of localized structures (dissipative solitons) in a one-dimensional optical Fabry–Perot passive Kerr cavity. The Kerr-like medium is a non-instantaneous, diffusive ultra-thin film of liquid crystal inserted in a low-finesse cavity. Solitons with oscillating tails are experimentally observed in this system that can lock together to form complexes of solitons. The numerical simulations carried out on an infinite-dimensional map describing the intra-cavity field dynamics fully agree with the experimental observations.

Spatio-temporal dynamics of a weakly multimode CO2 laser

Abstract The behavior of a slightly asymmetric weakly multimode CO 2 laser is studied experimentally and compared with that of perfectly cylindrically symmetrical lasers. It is found that in most cases, the system symmetry breaking destroys the vortices, although it appears that for a very small loss of symmetry, the behavior of the laser remains symmetrical.

Impact of the third-order dispersion on the modulation instability gain of pulsed signals

We demonstrate that modulation instability gain of time-localized signals (i.e., pulsed signals) depends strongly on the third-order dispersion, contrary to the well-known case of time-extended signals (cw signals). This surprising contribution of an odd dispersion term on this four-photon-mixing process is established analytically and confirmed by numerical simulations.

Experimental evidence of dynamical propagation for solitary waves in ultra slow stochastic non-local Kerr medium.

We perform a statistical analysis of the optical solitary wave propagation in an ultra-slow stochastic non-local focusing Kerr medium such as liquid crystals. Our experimental results show that the localized beam trajectory presents a dynamical random walk whose beam position versus the propagation distance z depicts two different kind of evolutions A power law is found for the beam position standard deviation during the first stage of propagation. It obeys approximately z3/2 up to ten times the power threshold for solitary wave generation.

Photo-isomerization fronts in dye-doped nematic liquid crystals

An experimental study of the photo-isomerization dynamics in dye-doped nematic crystals is reported, which shows that, when the sample is illuminated by a Gaussian beam, and for high enough input power, a transition from the nematic to the isotropic phase takes place in the illuminated area. The two phases are spatially connected via a front propagating outward from the center of the beam and following the local intensity profile and thus inducing a photo-controlled optical aperture. The optical intensity and temperature fields on the sample follow the same dynamical profile. The front dynamics is described by a phenomenological bi-stable model with an inhomogeneous control parameter, directly related to the beam intensity profile.

Traveling solitary wave induced by nonlocality in dispersive shock wave generation(Conference Presentation)

Shock waves are well-known nonlinear waves, displaying an abrupt discontinuity. Observation can be made in a lot of physical fields, as in water wave, plasma and nonlinear optics. Shock waves can either break or relax through either catastrophic or regularization phenomena. In this work, we restrain our study to dispersive shock waves. This regularization phenomenon implies the emission of dispersive waves. We demonstrate experimentally and numerically the generation of spatial dispersive shock waves in a nonlocal focusing media. The generation of dispersive shock wave in a focusing media is more problematic than in a defocusing one. Indeed, the modulational instability has to be frustrated to observe this phenomenon. In 2010, the dispersive shock wave was demonstrated experimentally in a focusing media with a partially coherent beam [1]. Another way is to use a nonlocal media [2]. The impact of nonlocality is more important than the modulational instability frustration. Here, we use nematic liquid crystals (NLC) as Kerr-like nonlocal medium. To achieve shock formation, we use the Riemann condition as initial spatial condition (edge at the beam entrance of the NLC cell). In these experimental conditions, we generate, experimentally and numerically, shock waves that relax through the emission of dispersive waves. Associated with this phenomenon, we evidence the emergence of a localized wave that travels through the transverse beam profile. The beam steepness, which is a good indicator of the shock formation, is maximal at the shock point position. This latter follows a power law versus the injected power as in [3]. Increasing the injected power, we found multiple shock points. We have good agreements between the numerical simulations and the experimental results. [1] W. Wan, D. V Dylov, C. Barsi, and J. W. Fleischer, Opt. Lett. 35, 2819 (2010). [2] G. Assanto, T. R. Marchant, and N. F. Smyth, Phys. Rev. A - At. Mol. Opt. Phys. 78, 1 (2008). [3] N. Ghofraniha, L. S. Amato, V. Folli, S. Trillo, E. DelRe, and C. Conti, Opt. Lett. 37, 2325 (2012).

Control and generation of drifting patterns by asymmetrical Fourier filtering.

We report the theoretical and experimental demonstration of one-dimensional drifting patterns generated by asymmetrical Fourier filtering in the transverse plane of an optical feedback system with a Kerr type nonlinearity. We show, with good agreement between our theoretical (analytics and numerics) calculations and experimental observations that at the primary instability threshold the group velocity is always different from zero. Consequently, the system is convective at this threshold, then exhibits drifting patterns.