Space-Time Wave Packet in Dispersive Media

Our new paper titled “Nondispersive Space-Time Wave Packet Propagating in Dispersive Media” is published in Laser & Photonics Reviews.

In this work, we propose a new scheme to overcome chromatic dispersion in any dispersive medium at arbitrary wavelengths without using additional compensating elements. Specifically, we introduce a new type of propagation-invariant space-time wave packets that exhibit neither diffraction nor dispersion in a dispersive medium. Such wave packets have a special form of spatio-temporal spectral correlation that precisely compensates the chromatic dispersion under propagation. We also discover a modified law of refraction for such non-dispersive space-time wave packets.

Our work highlights the significant opportunities of spatio-temporal engineering in dispersion compensation and may enable potential applications of space-time wave packets. Our work also points to the significant opportunities for creating space-time wavepackets in other general wave systems with different dispersion relations, such as acoustic waves or quantum waves.

Fig 1：a-c Light cone of free space (a) and dispersive medium (b, c). d Gaussian wave packet spreads in dispersive medium while the space-time wave packet remains invariant. e-h Spectrum and intensity distribution of Gaussian wave packet. i-l Spectrum and intensity distribution of space-time wave packet.

Fig 2：Modified law of refraction for space-time wave packet.

Related news：https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/0XB-QfqIyeL-piDDwNgGnQ

For full text: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/lpor.202100634