Anderson localization and saturable nonlinearity in one-dimensional disordered lattices

TL;DR

This paper numerically studies how disorder and saturable nonlinearity affect Anderson localization in a one-dimensional lattice, revealing nonmonotonic localization length behavior and saturation effects at high intensities.

Contribution

It introduces a numerical scheme to analyze localization in disordered nonlinear lattices, highlighting the impact of saturable nonlinearity on Anderson localization.

Findings

Localization length is nonmonotonic with incident wave intensity.

Saturation effects can suppress localization at high intensities.

Localization is stronger at higher incident wave energies.

Abstract

We investigate numerically the propagation and the Anderson localization of plane waves in a one-dimensional lattice chain, where disorder and saturable nonlinearity are simultaneously present. Using a calculation scheme for solving the stationary discrete nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equation in the fixed input case, the disorder-averaged logarithmic transmittance and the localization length are calculated in a numerically precise manner. The localization length is found to be a nonmonotonic function of the incident wave intensity, acquiring a minimum value at a certain finite intensity, due to saturation effects. For low incident intensities where the saturation effect is ineffective, the enhancement of localization due to Kerr-type nonlinearity occurs in a way similar to the case without saturation. For sufficiently high incident intensities, we find that the localization length is an increasing function of the incident wave intensity, which implies that localization is suppressed for stronger input intensities, and ultimately approaches a saturation value. This feature is associated with the fact that the nonlinear system is reduced to an effectively linear one, when either the incident wave intensity or the saturation parameter is sufficiently large. We also find that the nonlinear saturation effect is stronger and more pronounced when the energy of the incident wave is larger.