Abstract

The nonlinear Schrodinger equation arises naturally in a variety of physical processes; in particular, it is fundamentally important to nonlinear optics. Both the analytic and numerical solutions of this equation have been extensively investigated; a recent review by Taha and Ablowitz¹ suggests that for soliton propagation problems the method of Hardin and Tapped² is the superior numerical method. In this paper, the split operator Fourier transform (SOFT) method, originally due to Fleck et al.,³ is demonstrated to be applicable to the nonlinear Schrodinger equation. For the particular soliton problem studied,⁴ the results obtained with the SOFT method are found to be an order of magnitude more accurate than those obtained with the Hardin-Tappert method.

© 1986 Optical Society of America