Abstract

The evolution of the polarization state in a cubic material with an anisotropic Kerr nonlinearity is examined. It is shown that in certain cases this provides a mechanism for nonlinear-optical activity, leaving the state of the polarization unchanged but causing a significant rotation in its major axis. The use of the anisotropic ultrafast nonlinear refraction that exists just beneath the half-gap in semiconductors to demonstrate these effects is discussed.

© 1995 Optical Society of America

Polarization dependence of ultrafast nonlinear refraction in an AlGaAs waveguide at the half-band gap

D. C. Hutchings, J. S. Aitchison, B. S. Wherrett, G. T. Kennedy, and W. Sibbett
Opt. Lett. 20(9) 991-993 (1995)

Nonlinear refractive coupling and vector solitons in anisotropic cubic media

D. C. Hutchings, J. S. Aitchison, and J. M. Arnold
J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 14(4) 869-879 (1997)

Intrinsic and induced anisotropy of nonlinear absorption and refraction in zinc blende semiconductors

W. Andreas Schroeder, D. S. McCallum, D. R. Harken, Mark D. Dvorak, David R. Andersen, Arthur L. Smirl, and Brian S. Wherrett
J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 12(3) 401-415 (1995)

Measurements of the tensor properties of third-order nonlinearities in wide-gap semiconductors

Todd D. Krauss, Jinendra K. Ranka, Frank W. Wise, and Alexander L. Gaeta
Opt. Lett. 20(10) 1110-1112 (1995)

Cubic optical nonlinearity of free electrons in bulk gold

N. I. Zheludev, P. J. Bennett, H. Loh, S. V. Popov, I. R. Shatwell, Yu. P. Svirko, V. E. Gusev, V. F. Kamalov, and E. V. Slobodchikov
Opt. Lett. 20(12) 1368-1370 (1995)