Linear distributed Bragg cavity effects on optical limiting in two- and three-level media

A lumped distributed Bragg reflector (DBR)-nonlinear layer-DBR system is used to explore how nonlinear optical effects (in particular, optical limiting) are modulated by the dispersive character of the (optically linear) DBR. A three-level quantum optics model of the nonlinear layer is used to find self-consistent numerical solutions to the (nonlinear) optical transport in the composite system. We find that the intensity dependence of the real part of the index can be combined with the dispersion in the (linear) DBR to cause optical limiting even for materials that have only a saturated absorber (two-level) response.