A new unsaturated wind-chime model is proposed for calculating the formation time of the diffraction rings induced by spatial self-phase modulation (SSPM) in molybdenum disulfide suspension. To optimize the traditional wind-chime model, the concentration variable of 2D materials was introduced. The results of the unsaturated wind-chime model match quite well with the SSPM experimental results of molybdenum disulfide. Based on this model, the shortest formation time of diffraction rings and their corresponding concentration and light intensity can be predicted using limited data. Theoretically, by increasing the viscosity coefficient of the solution, the response time of the diffraction ring, to reach the maximum value, can be significantly reduced. It has advanced significance in shortening the response time of photonic diodes.

The reorientation of 2D materials caused by nonlocal electron coherence is the formation mechanism of 2D material spatial self-phase modulation under laser irradiation, which is widely known as the “wind-chime” model. Here, we present a method that provides strong evidence for the reorientation of 2D-material-induced spatial self-phase modulation. The traditional “wind-chime” model was modified by taking into account the attenuation, i.e., damping of the incident light beam in the direction of the optical path. Accordingly, we can extract the nonlinear refractive index of a single MoS2 nanosheet, instead of simply obtaining the index from an equivalent MoS2 film that was constructed by all nanosheets. Our approach introduces a universal and accurate method to extract intrinsic nonlinear optical parameters from 2D material systems.

We investigate the nonlinear response of terahertz (THz) metamaterial perfect absorbers consisting of electric split ring resonators on GaAs integrated with a polyimide spacer and gold ground plane. These perfect absorbers on bulk semi-insulating GaAs are characterized using high-field THz time-domain spectroscopy. The resonance frequency redshifts 20 GHz and the absorbance is reduced by 30% as the incident peak field is increased from 30 to 300 kV/cm. The nonlinear response arises from THz field driven interband transitions and intervalley scattering in the GaAs. To eliminate the Fresnel losses from the GaAs substrate, we design and fabricate a flexible metamaterialsaturable perfect absorber. The ability to create nonlinear absorbers enables appealing applications such as optical limiting and self-focusing.authors would like to thank the Boston University Photonics Center for technical support.