Shortcuts to adiabatic soliton compression in active nonlinear Kerr media.

We implement variational shortcuts to adiabaticity for optical pulse compression in an active nonlinear Kerr medium with distributed amplification and spatially varying dispersion and nonlinearity. Starting with the hyperbolic secant ansatz, we employ a variational approximation to systematically derive dynamical equations, establishing analytical relationships linking the amplitude, width, and chirp of the pulse. Through the inverse engineering approach, we manipulate the distributed gain/loss, nonlinearity and dispersion profiles to efficiently compress the optical pulse over a reduced distance with high fidelity.

Generation of THz radiation through molecular modulation in hydrogen-filled hybrid anti-resonant fibers.

We study the generation of narrowband terahertz (THz) pulses by stimulated Raman scattering and molecular modulation in hydrogen-filled hybrid hollow-core fibers. Using a judicious combination of materials and transverse structures, this waveguide design enables simultaneous confinement of optical and THz signals with reasonably low attenuation, as well as high nonlinear overlap. The THz pulses are then generated as the second Stokes band of a ns-long near-infrared pump pulse, aided by Raman coherence waves excited in the gaseous core by the beat-note created by the pump and its first Stokes band.

Efficient self-compression of ultrashort near-UV pulses in air-filled hollow-core photonic crystal fibers.

We report generation of ultrashort near-UV pulses by soliton self-compression in kagomé-style hollow-core photonic crystal fibers filled with ambient air. Pump pulses with the energy of 2.6 µJ and duration of 54 fs at 400 nm were compressed temporally by a factor of 5, to a duration of ∼11 fs.

Generation of broadband mid-IR and UV light in gas-filled single-ring hollow-core PCF.

We report generation of an ultrafast supercontinuum extending into the mid- infrared in gas-filled single-ring hollow-core photonic crystal fiber (SR-PCF) pumped by 1.7 µm light from an optical parametric amplifier. The simple fiber structure offers shallow dispersion and flat transmission in the near and mid-infrared, enabling the generation of broadband spectra extending from 270 nm to 3.

Modulational instability windows in the nonlinear Schrödinger equation involving higher-order Kerr responses.

We introduce a complete analytical and numerical study of the modulational instability process in a system governed by a canonical nonlinear Schrödinger equation involving local, arbitrary nonlinear responses to the applied field. In particular, our theory accounts for the recently proposed higher-order Kerr nonlinearities, providing very simple analytical criteria for the identification of multiple regimes of stability and instability of plane-wave solutions in such systems. Moreover, we discuss a new parametric regime in the higher-order Kerr response, which allows for the observation of several, alternating stability-instability windows defining a yet unexplored instability landscape.

Selective excitation of higher order modes in hollow-core PCF via prism-coupling.

Prism-coupling through the microstructured cladding is used to selectively excite individual higher order modes in hollow-core photonic crystal fibers (PCFs). Mode selection is achieved by varying the angle between the incoming beam and the fiber axis, in order to match the axial wavevector component to that of the desired mode. The technique allows accurate measurement of the effective indices and transmission losses of modes of arbitrary order, even those with highly complex transverse field distributions that would be extremely difficult to excite by conventional endfire coupling.

Measuring extreme vacuum pressure with ultraintense lasers.

We show that extreme vacuum pressures can be measured with current technology by detecting the photons produced by the relativistic Thomson scattering of ultraintense laser light by the electrons of the medium. We compute the amount of radiation scattered at different frequencies and angles when a Gaussian laser pulse crosses a vacuum tube and design strategies for the efficient measurement of pressure. In particular, we show that a single day experiment at a high repetition rate petawatt laser facility such as Vega, that will be operating in 2014 in Salamanca, will be sensitive, in principle, to pressures p as low as 10(-16)Pa, and will be able to provide highly reliable measurements for p >/~ 10(-14)Pa.

Fermionic light in common optical media.

Recent experiments have proved that the response to short laser pulses of common optical media, such as air or oxygen, can be described by focusing Kerr and higher order nonlinearities of alternating signs. Such media support the propagation of steady solitary waves. We argue by both numerical and analytical computations that the low-power fundamental bright solitons satisfy an equation of state which is similar to that of a degenerate gas of fermions at zero temperature.

Pressure, surface tension, and dripping of self-trapped laser beams.

We show that a laser beam which propagates through an optical medium with Kerr (focusing) and higher order (defocusing) nonlinearities displays pressure and surface-tension properties yielding capillarity and dripping effects totally analogous to usual liquid droplets. The system is reinterpreted in terms of a thermodynamic grand potential, allowing for the computation of the pressure and surface tension beyond the usual hydrodynamical approach based on Madelung transformation and the analogy with the Euler equation. We then show both analytically and numerically that the stationary soliton states of such a light system satisfy the Young-Laplace equation and that the dynamical evolution through a capillary is described by the same law that governs the growth of droplets in an ordinary liquid system.

Supersolitons: solitonic excitations in atomic soliton chains.

We show that, by tuning interactions in nonintegrable vector nonlinear Schrödinger equations modeling Bose-Einstein condensates and other relevant physical systems, it is possible to achieve a regime of elastic particlelike collisions between solitons. This would allow one to construct a Newton's cradle with solitons and supersolitons: localized collective excitations in solitary-wave chains.