title: Soliton fission and supercontinuum generation in silicon waveguides.
abstract: We show through numerical simulations that silicon waveguides can be used to create a supercontinuum extending over 400 nm by launching femtosecond pulses as higher-order solitons. The physical process behind continuum generation is related to soliton fission, self-phase modulation, and generation of Cherenkov radiation. In contrast with optical fibers, stimulated Raman scattering plays little role. As low-energy (approximately 1 pJ) pulses and short waveguides (<1 cm) are sufficient for continuum generation, the proposed scheme should prove useful for practical applications.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Optics, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14627, USA.
authors.forename: Lianghong
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Yin
authors.forename: Qiang
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.forename: Govind P
authors.initials: GP
authors.lastname: Agrawal