Dispersive Dam-Break Flow of a Photon Fluid

Gang Xu (1) , Matteo Conforti (1) , Alexandre Kudlinski (1) , Arnaud Mussot (1) , Stefano Trillo (2)

1 PhLAM - Laboratoire de Physique des Lasers, Atomes et Molécules - UMR 8523
2 Engineering Department [Ferrara]

We investigate the temporal photonic analogue of the dam-break phenomenon for shallow water by exploiting a fiber optics setup. We clearly observe the decay of the step-like input (photonic dam) into a pair of oppositely propagating rarefaction wave and dispersive shock wave. Our results show evidence for a critical transition of the dispersive shock into a self-cavitating state. The detailed observation of the cavitating state dynamics allows for a fully quantitative test of the Whitham modulation theory applied to the universal defocusing nonlinear Schrödinger equation.

Domaines: Formation de Structures et Solitons [nlin.PS]; Optique [physics.optics]

Gang Xu, Matteo Conforti, Alexandre Kudlinski, Arnaud Mussot, Stefano Trillo. Dispersive Dam-Break Flow of a Photon Fluid. Physical Review Letters, 2017, 118 (25), ⟨10.1103/PhysRevLett.118.254101⟩. ⟨hal-02386195⟩