Saturable impurity in an optical array: Green function approach

TL;DR

This paper uses Green function formalism to analyze a one-dimensional waveguide array with a saturable impurity, revealing conditions for localized modes, transmission behavior, and selftrapping phenomena.

Contribution

It provides a closed-form analytical solution for localized modes and transmission in a saturable impurity system, highlighting differences between bulk and surface impurities.

Findings

A localized impurity state always exists in the bulk case.

Surface impurity requires a minimum nonlinearity for bound states.

Transmission shows sub-linear behavior with no resonances.

Abstract

We examine a one-dimensional linear waveguide array containing a single saturable waveguide. By using the formalism of lattice Green functions, we compute in closed form the localized mode and the transmission across the impurity in closed form. For the single saturable impurity in the bulk, we find that an impurity state is always possible, independent of the impurity strength. For the surface saturable impurity case, a minimum nonlinearity strength is necessary to create a bound state. The transmission coefficient across the impurity shows a sub-linear behavior with an absence of any resonance. The dynamical selftrapping at the bulk impurity site shows no selftrapping transition, and it resembles the behavior of a weak linear impurity. For the surface impurity however, there is a selftrapping transition at a critical nonlinearity value. The asymptotic propagation of the optical power shows a ballistic character in both cases, with a speed that decreases with an increase in nonlinearity strength.