Modulational instability of coupled nonlinear field equations for pulse propagation in a negative index material embedded into a Kerr medium

We have investigated the modulation instability (MI) in a negative index media (NIM) or metamaterial (MM) using a new generalized model describing the pulse propagation in a NIM embedded into a Kerr medium. We have found that one could control the gain of MI in an MM by tuning the initial electric or magnetic field amplitudes. Our model successfully recovers previously proposed models to describe pulse propagation in MMs exhibiting Kerr nonlinearity. Moreover, it contains a few additional terms connecting both the electric and magnetic field envelopes in an MM. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America