Eur. Phys. J. D 44, 547-556 (2007)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/e2007-00227-1

Mode hopping strongly affects observability of dynamical instability in optical parametric oscillators

¹ Laboratoire PALMS, UMR CNRS 6627, Université de Rennes I, Campus de Beaulieu, 35042 Rennes Cedex, France
² Laboratoire PhLAM, UMR CNRS 8523, CERLA, Université des Sciences et Technologies de Lille, 59655 Villeneuve d'Ascq Cedex, France

Corresponding author: ^a axelle.amon@univ-rennes1.fr

Received: 30 January 2007
Revised: 29 May 2007
Published online: 29 June 2007

Abstract

Theoretical investigations of dynamical behavior in optical parametric oscillators (OPO) have generally assumed that the cavity detunings of the interacting fields are controllable parameters. However, OPOs are known to experience mode hops, where the system jumps to the mode of lowest cavity detuning. We note that this phenomenon significantly limits the range of accessible detunings and thus may prevent instabilities predicted to occur above a minimum detuning from being evidenced experimentally. As a simple example among a number of instability mechanisms possibly affected by this limitation, we discuss the Hopf bifurcation leading to periodic behavior in the monomode mean-field model of a triply resonant OPO and show that it probably can be observed only in very specific setups.