The interaction of photorefractive solitons in a SBN crystal

Results of experimental and theoretical investigations of a coherent 2D optical soliton interaction in a SBN crystal is presented. The influence of the distance between solitons with equal intensities along the optical axis is studied. The relative position of beams along the optical axis is taken into account. The interaction of four solitons with equal intensities is also investigated. Experimental and theoretical results show that the distance between the centers of input beams placed in the corners of a rectangle should be more than 3.2 FWHM along both directions to avoid the interaction of solitons.