Abstract

We consider a nonlinear medium whose polarization P is described by a nonlinear oscillator equation.^1,2 The steady-state fields are analytically solved for plane waves in a slowly varying envelope approximation. We find the conditions for the appearance of a boundary in the medium separating a high-polarization branch of stationary solutions from a low-polarization branch. We show how this boundary can be probed by the reflected intensity and by degenerate four-wave mixing spectroscopy, and results are given for these cases. We also use a numerical procedure to solve the steady-state equations which include one transverse dimension. There is an interesting change in the on-axis behavior related to the self-focusing effects for Fresnel numbers of order unity.

© 1987 Optical Society of America