All optical switching of reflectivity and transmissivity by a nonlinear sandwich

Author

Strobl, Karlheinz ; Golub, Ilya

Author_Institution

Los Alamos Nat. Lab., NM, USA

Volume

28

Issue

6

fYear

1992

fDate

6/1/1992 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

1435

Lastpage

1438

Abstract

A simple model system comprised of a thin nonlinear layer sandwiched between two glass plates is demonstrated. This nonlinear sandwich allows the investigation of both the transmitted and reflected beams for all-optical switching. With a thermal (negative) nonlinearity high-contrast switching is obtained within several nanoseconds. The authors also show for the first time, the avoidance of multiple thresholds and associated beam breakup for a nonsaturating nonlinearity for both the transmitted and reflected beams. This promises cascadability of all optical devices based on the nonlinear interface

Keywords

integrated optics; nonlinear optics; optical films; optical switches; reflectivity; all-optical switching; cascadability; glass plates; high-contrast switching; nanoseconds; nonlinear interface; nonlinear sandwich; nonsaturating nonlinearity; optical switching; reflected beams; reflectivity; thermal negative nonlinearity; thin nonlinear layer; transmissivity; transmitted beams; Displays; Glass; Laser beams; Nonlinear optics; Optical bistability; Optical devices; Optical materials; Optical reflection; Optical scattering; Reflectivity;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9197

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/3.135294

Filename

135294