Eur. Phys. J. D (2013) 67: 221
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/e2013-40197-y

Regular Article

The formation and transformation of the spatial weak-light bright and dark solitons in a quantum dot molecule with the interdot tunneling coupling

¹ Department of Physics, Xiangtan University, Xiangtan 411105, P.R. China
² Department of Physics, Tongren University, Tongren 554300, P.R. China

^a e-mail: dlwang@xtu.edu.cn

Received: 6 April 2013
Received in final form: 23 June 2013
Published online: 1 November 2013

Abstract

We study analytically the properties of the optical absorption and the spatial weak-light solitons in a quantum dot molecule system with the interdot tunneling coupling (ITC). It is shown that, for the linear case, there exists tunneling induced transparency (TIT) in the context of a weak ITC, while the TIT can be replaced by Autler-Townes splitting in the presence of a strong ITC. For the nonlinear case, it is probable to realize the spatial optical solitons even under weak light intensity. Interestingly, we find that there appears transformation behavior between the bright and dark solitons by properly turning both the ITC strength and the detuning of the probe field. Meanwhile, the transformation condition of the bright and dark solitons is obtained. Additionally it is also found that the amplitude of the solitons first descends and then rises with the increasing of ITC strength. Our results may have potential applications for nonlinear optical experiments and optical telecommunication engineering in solid systems.