Soliton glasses in Fabry-Perot resonators.

Area of Science:

• Nonlinear optics
• Microresonator physics
• Frequency comb generation

Background:

• Microresonator-based frequency combs are valuable for RF applications.
• Nonlinear states like soliton crystals exhibit rich optical spectra.
• Crystalline defects can influence microresonator frequency comb properties.

Purpose of the Study:

• To report the existence of a novel soliton glass solution.
• To theoretically analyze the stability of soliton glass in Fabry-Perot microresonators.
• To compare soliton glass properties with existing soliton states.

Main Methods:

• Solving a modified Lugiato-Lefever equation.
• Theoretical stability analysis for Fabry-Perot microresonators.
• Computational verification using evolutionary simulations and noise.
• Linear stability analysis of perturbed solutions.

Main Results:

• Identified a novel soliton glass solution.
• Demonstrated theoretical stability of soliton glass in microresonators.
• Soliton glass exhibits spectral line spacing equal to the inverse cavity repetition time.
• Observed stable aperiodic temporal spacing between soliton pulses.
• Characterized soliton glass by short-range order and long-range disorder.
• Identified transition regions involving spatio-temporal chaos.
• Computationally verified stability over 2000 photon lifetimes with noise.
• Demonstrated linear stability with perturbations decaying on the photon lifetime scale.

Conclusions:

• Soliton glass represents a new stable nonlinear state in microresonators.
• This state offers unique spectral and temporal characteristics for frequency comb generation.
• The findings provide a new avenue for developing advanced RF applications using microresonator frequency combs.