Or Peleg

Klein tunneling in deformed honeycomb lattices.

We study the scattering of waves off a potential step in deformed honeycomb lattices. For small deformations below a critical value, perfect Klein tunneling is obtained. This means that a potential step in any direction transmits waves at normal incidence with unit transmission probability, irrespective of the details of the potential. Beyond the critical deformation, a gap in the spectrum is formed, and a potential step in the deformation direction reflects all normal-incidence waves, exhibiting a dramatic transition form unit transmission to total reflection. These phenomena are generic to honeycomb lattice systems, and apply to electromagnetic waves in photonic lattices, quasi-particles in graphene, cold atoms in optical lattices.

Symmetry breaking in honeycomb photonic lattices

We study the phenomena associated with symmetry breaking in honeycomb photonic lattices. As the honeycomb structure is gradually deformed, conical diffraction around its diabolic points becomes elliptic and eventually no longer occurs. As the deformation is further increased, a gap opens between the first two bands, and the lattice can support a gap soliton. The existence of the gap soliton serves as a means to detect the symmetry breaking and provide an estimate of the size of the gap.

Breakdown of Dirac dynamics in honeycomb lattices due to nonlinear interactions

We study the dynamics of coherent waves in nonlinear honeycomb lattices and show that nonlinearity breaks down the Dirac dynamics. As an example, we demonstrate that even a weak nonlinearity has major qualitative effects on one of the hallmarks of honeycomb lattices: conical diffraction. Under linear conditions, a circular input wave packet associated with the Dirac point evolves into a ring, but even a weak nonlinearity alters the evolution such that the emerging beam possesses triangular symmetry, and populates Bloch modes outside of the Dirac cone. Our results are presented in the context of optics, but we propose a scheme to observe equivalent phenomena in Bose-Einstein condensates.

Optical transitions and Rabi oscillations in waveguide arrays.

It is theoretically demonstrated that Rabi interband oscillations are possible in waveguide arrays. Such transitions can take place in optical lattices when the unit-cell is periodically modulated along the propagation direction. Under phase-matching conditions, direct power transfer between two Floquet-Bloch modes can occur. In the nonlinear domain, periodic oscillations between two different lattice solitons are also possible.

Multisoliton ejection from an amplifying potential trap

We study theoretically the dynamics of a beam launched inside an amplifying trap potential. Raising the amplification transforms the dynamics from linear tunneling at low amplification to periodic ejection of a sequence of identical solitons (when the amplification rate exceeds the tunneling rate) and, at strong amplification, to nonperiodic multisoliton ejection.

High-frequency electron beam modulation by a ferroelectric cathode with anomalous plasma resistance

Spectroscopic measurements are reported of the plasma formed inside a cathode having a ferroelectric source incorporated in it. These measurements were performed during the generation of a high-frequency modulated electron beam in a planar diode with the above cathode. It was found that there is a spatially periodic structure in the plasma density, electric field, and electron energy in the plasma in the longitudinal direction from the ferroelectric surface. The plasma density, electric field, and electron energy vary in the range of 5×1013–5×1014 cm−3, 0–1 kV/cm, and 2–30 eV, respectively. Also, it was found that the plasma electron temperature is ∼8 eV in the vicinity of the ferroelectric surface and ∼2 eV in the bulk of the plasma. To explain the obtained experimental data a qualitative model is suggested. The model is based on fast periodic appearance of anomalous plasma resistance due to generation of ion-acoustic instability. The latter is controlled by the ratio between the velocities of the curren...

Self-phase modulation spectral broadening in two-dimensional spatial solitons: toward three-dimensional spatiotemporal pulse-train solitons

We demonstrate self-phase modulation (SPM) spectral broadening in two-dimensional solitons in homogeneous media using two different schemes. In the active mode, a train of pulses are collectively trapped and form a spatial soliton through a photorefractive, slowly responding, and electronically controlled self-focusing nonlinearity, and each pulse experiences spectral broadening by the fast SPM nonlinearity. In the passive mode, the pulse-train beam is guided in a waveguide that is optically induced by a continuous-wave thermal spatial soliton. The soliton formation increased the normalized spectral broadening factor from 0.5% up to 197%. This experiment presents significant progress toward the experimental demonstration of three-dimensional spatiotemporal pulse-train solitons.

Coherent coupling of alkali atoms by random collisions.

Random spin-exchange collisions in warm alkali vapor cause rapid decoherence and act to equilibrate the spin state of the atoms in the vapor. In contrast, here we demonstrate experimentally and theoretically a coherent coupling of one alkali species to another species, mediated by these random collisions. We show that the minor species (potassium) inherits the magnetic properties of the dominant species (rubidium), including its lifetime (T_{1}), coherence time (T_{2}), gyromagnetic ratio, and spin-exchange relaxation-free magnetic-field threshold. We further show that this coupling can be completely controlled by varying the strength of the magnetic field. Finally, we explain these phenomena analytically by mode mixing of the two species via spin-exchange collisions.

Nonlinear Elimination of Spin-Exchange Relaxation of High Magnetic Moments

Relaxation of the Larmor magnetic moment by spin-exchange collisions has been shown to diminish for high alkali densities, resulting from the linear part of the collisional interaction. In contrast, we demonstrate both experimentally and theoretically the elimination of spin-exchange relaxation of high magnetic moments (birefringence) in alkali vapor. This elimination originates from the nonlinear part of the spin-exchange interaction, as a scattering process of the Larmor magnetic moment. We find counterintuitively that the threshold magnetic field is the same as in the Larmor case, despite the fact that the precession frequency is twice as large.

Self-trapped leaky waves and their interactions

We present soleakon: nonlinear self-trapped leaky modes displaying particlelike features. A “soleakon” forms when a wave function induces a potential barrier, whose resonant state (leaky mode corresponds to the wave function itself. We show that, for a proper set of parameters, soleakons are robust and propagate while maintaining their envelope almost indefinitely. However, they eventually disintegrate abruptly. These entities exhibit particlelike interactions behavior, which is nevertheless profoundly different from soliton collisions.