Intermodal all-optical pulse switching and frequency conversion using temporal reflection and refraction in multimode fibers

Abstract

In this work, we extend temporal reflection and refraction analogies from the case of singlemode optical fibers to multimode fibers. Specifically, we show that nonlinear multimode fibers provide novel degrees of freedom that permit us to control optical pulse interactions. We take advantage of the properties of pulses propagating in different modes, such as their group velocities, dispersion parameters, and effective mode areas, in the presence of the Kerr effect. Our study was carried out by numerically solving the multimode nonlinear Schrödinger equations for graded-index optical fibers. From this analysis, we find a useful tool to obtain novel all-optical switching and frequency conversion schemes in multimode fibers.