Localized chaos of elliptically polarized cavity solitons in broad-area VCSEL with a saturable absorber

We introduce a spin-flip model for a broad-area vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) with a saturable absorber. We demonstrate simultaneous existence of orthogonally linearly polarized and elliptically polarized cavity solitons. We show that polarization degree of freedom leads to a period-doubling route to spatially localized chaos of the elliptically polarized cavity solitons. (C) 2018 Optical Society of America