Compression, splitting and switching of bright and dark solitons in nonlinear directional coupler

A detailed numerical simulation of the switching, compression and splitting characteristics of various solitary pulses (bright, grey and dark) are carried out by a direct solution of the associated coupled NLS equation. Important physical parameters of the out going pulse such as, intensity distribution, root mean square spatial and temporal width and chirp are calculated. Both the cases of symmetric and asymmetric couplers are considered. The important phenomenon of periodic power transfer from one channel to the other unfolds. The compression varies with the type of pulse launched in the initial channel. It is observed that the chirping of the initial pulse has an optimum value and it vary quite noticeably with the character of the pulse and couplers, symmetric and asymmetric.