Dark soliton switching in an NLDC in the presence of higher-order perturbative effects

Dark soliton switching in a nonlinear directional coupler in the presence of intermodal dispersion, cross-phase modulation (CPM), third-order dispersion, Raman effect, and self-steepening effect is reported for the first time. It is shown that, with the exception of CPM, all of the other perturbative effects have almost no effect on the switching characteristics of the dark soliton switch, which is an improvement over the corresponding bright soliton switch. Although the CPM increases the critical power of dark soliton switching, the soliton pulse remains stable inside the coupler during its propagation. (c) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.