Shalva Amiranashvili
Controlling light by light
shalva.amiranashvili@wias-berlin.de
Weierstrass Institute, Mohrenstr. 39, 10117 Berlin, Germany
We discuss propagation of ultrashort solitary pulses in nonlinear single-mode optical fibers. Each pulse creates a moving perturbation of the refractive index; the perturbation is capable to scatter co-propagating pulses. An ultrashort optical soliton serves, under suitable conditions, as an impenetrable mirror for the group-velocity matched small-amplitude waves. Reflection of such waves by a quickly moving mirror in dispersive media is a rich source of the intriguing phenomena including analogue event horizons and radiation at negative frequencies. On the other hand, energy exchange between the scattered pump waves and the soliton provides an effective way to manipulate the soliton, e.g., to fix its frequency or to compress it to a large extent.