A method of measuring the nonlinear refractive index cofficient of a bistable resonant cavity optical component.

摘要

In order to determine the nonlinear refractive index coefficient of a material which, once inserted into a Fabry-Perot cavity (1), has an optically bistable behaviour, the output power (l2; l3) of the cavity (1) is measured in function of the power (l1) of an amplitude-modulated optical input signal to obtain the material hysteresis loop; the hysteresis loop saturation region is detected, where the phase ( phi ) of the electromagnetic field associated with the signal within the cavity is a linear function of the output power; the values of the phase ( phi ) in said region are obtained from the output and input power values (l2, l3; l1) and the nonlinear refractive index coefficient (n2) is obtained from the angular coefficient of the straight line representing said phase (Fig. 1). <IMAGE>