Regenerative vectorial breathers in a delay-coupled excitable microlaser with integrated saturable absorber

Area of Science:

• Nonlinear optics
• Laser physics
• Photonics

Background:

• Micropillar lasers with saturable absorbers (SA) can generate regenerative light pulses.
• Operation in an excitable regime mimics biological neuron behavior, producing pulse trains.
• Polarization dynamics in lasers are crucial for various applications.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the polarization dynamics of regenerative light pulses in a coupled micropillar laser system.
• To experimentally observe and theoretically analyze regenerative vectorial breathers (RVBs).
• To explore the potential of these systems for flexible polarized pulse sources and neuro-inspired computing.

Main Methods:

• Experimental setup: Micropillar laser with integrated SA and external feedback mirror.
• Operation in the excitable regime to generate a pulse train.
• Numerical analysis using a model incorporating polarization anisotropy.

Main Results:

• Experimental observation of regenerative vectorial breathers (RVBs) in the polarization angle.
• RVBs manifest as modulation of linear polarized intensity components, not total intensity.
• Numerical model successfully reproduces experimental results and predicts different operational regimes.

Conclusions:

• Polarization mode competition arises from symmetry-breaking bifurcations due to polarization anisotropy.
• The findings are relevant for developing flexible sources of polarized light pulses.
• Potential applications include neuro-inspired on-chip computing systems.