title: Stability of solitons in birefringent optical fibers. I: equal propagation amplitudes.
abstract: The effect of birefringence on soliton propagation in single-mode optical fibers is considered. Emphasis is on solitons with multipicosecond widths that are appropriate for communications applications. It is shown that while linear birefringence will lead to a substantial splitting of the two polarizations over 20 km, this effect can be eliminated by use of the Kerr nonlinearity. Above a certain amplitude threshold, the central frequency of each polarization shifts just enough to lock the two polarizations together.
authors.affiliation: Science Applications International Corporation, 1710 Goodridge Drive, McLean, Virginia 22102, USA.
authors.forename: C R
authors.initials: CR
authors.lastname: Menyuk