Accelerating Airy wave packets in the presence of quadratic and cubic dispersion

Abstract

The equation governing quadratic and cubic transparent dispersion within the framework of the slowly varying envelope approximation is shown to admit an infinite-energy uniformly moving Airy wave packet solution, as well as a square-integrable accelerating Airy solution. Some insight is provided regarding the local acceleration dynamics in the latter case and comparisons are made with the "accelerating" beam solution introduced by Siviloglou and Christodoulides and experimentally demonstrated by Siviloglou, Broky, Dogariu, and Christodoulides recently. It is shown, in particular, that under certain parametrizations, the presence of cubic dispersion can increase the "depth of penetration" of a wave packet. In other words, a pulse can propagate for a larger range without sustaining significant dispersive distortion than in the presence of quadratic dispersion alone. Finally, imaging properties of accelerating airy wave packets are discussed.