Control of soliton self-frequency shift dynamics via Airy soliton interaction

We investigate Airy-soliton interaction in a nonlinear fiber with Raman effect. We find that Airy solitons may fuse upon interaction at a position that can be controlled by a proper engineering of the Airy tail direction. This control allows us to generate Airy solitons with varying deceleration. At variance with the case of two solitons interaction, Raman-induced soliton self-frequency shift (SSFS) is strongly enhanced when the leading soliton is replaced with the accelerating Airy pulse and slightly suppressed for the decelerating one. These notable features are ascribed to the unique properties of asymmetrical Airy pulses with a switchable direction of the oscillatory tails. We show the way these processes are uncovered unambiguously by cross-correlation frequency resolved optical gating. We also investigate the impact of chirp imposed on the input pulse on the SSFS dynamics. Our results not only provide a new way to manipulate the SSFS, but may help to improve the control of soliton fusion events during supercontinuum generation, optical rogue waves and giant dispersive waves formation. (C) 2018 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement