Fast switching of photorefractive output by applied electric field

• Published in: Optics communications 2001, Vol.187 (1), p.7-15
• Main Authors: Taj, Imtiaz Ahmad, Xie, Ping, Mishima, Teruhito
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Applied electric field; Exact sciences and technology; Free space optical switching; Fundamental areas of phenomenology (including applications); Nonlinear optics; Optical bistability, multistability and switching, including local field effects; Optical bistability, multistability, and switching; Optical materials; Optics; Other nonlinear optical materials; photorefractive and semiconductor materials; Phase conjugation, optical mixing, and photorefractive effect; Phase conjugation, optical mixing; photorefractive and kerr effects; Phase mismatching; Photorefractive wave mixing; Physics; Pockels effect
• ISSN: 0030-4018; 1873-0310
• DOI: 10.1016/S0030-4018(00)01084-1

We show that photorefractive materials having large electro-optic coefficients such as BaTiO 3 require relatively small electric field to induce sufficient phase mismatch for the reduction of the diffraction efficiency to a large extent. In this way Pockels effect, which is very fast, can be used to control the diffraction efficiency in photorefractive wave mixing. The fast switching effect is shown in both two-wave mixing and four-wave mixing (FWM) geometries. We also show that optical switching based on orthogonally polarized photorefractive FWM has certain important advantages over that based on FWM with all extraordinary waves. This phenomenon can be very useful in fields like free space optical switching and interconnections.