Diffractive optics in nonlinear media with periodic structure

Abstract

The diffraction of time-harmonic waves in a nonlinear medium with periodic structure is studied in this paper. In particular second harmonic generation – an important phenomenon in nonlinear optics-is modelled. The model, derived from a general nonlinear system of Maxwell's equations, is shown to have a unique solution for all but a discrete number of frequencies. The problem is solved numerically by combining a method of finite elements and a fixed-point iteration scheme. Numerical experiments for some simple grating structures are presented and discussed.