Abstract

The effect of transverse intensity variation on the various instabilities associated with optical bistability seems to be catastrophic in the case of pure absorptive bistability^1,2 but benign in the mixed absorptive-dispersive case.^2,3 In particular, recent results of Lugiato et al.² indicate that the mean-field single-mode instability is not destroyed by the assumption of a Gaussian transverse intensity profile, and that it should be observable for experimentally accessible parameter values. Stimulated by these results, we have looked for and observed self-pulsing due to the single-mode instability in the predicted region of parameter space.

© 1984 Optical Society of America