Wave-mixing solitons in ferroelectric crystals

Although the sine-Gordon equation was originally obtained for the description of four-wave mixing in transmission geometry, it describes self-diffraction of the wave from shifted gratings as well. The sine-Gordon equation governs soliton propagation. The photoinduced amplitude of the refractive-index grating exhibits also a soliton shape in the crystal volume. The origin of this effect is the change of the contrast of light due to energy transfer between coupled waves during their propagation, which occurs in bulk crystals with strong photorefractive gain. The theoretical description shows the possibility to control the soliton properties by changing the input intensity ratio and/or input phase difference of the wave. The effect can lead to diffraction efficiency management, auto-oscillations and bistability of the output waves due to wave-mixing in ferroelectrics. Results on the first experimental observation of non-uniform distribution of the grating amplitude profile and its changes versus input intensity ratio are presented.