Generalized revival and splitting of an arbitrary optical field in GRIN media

Abstract

Assuming a non-paraxial propagation operator, we study the propagation of an electromagnetic field with an arbitrary initial condition in a quadratic GRIN medium. We show that at certain specific periodic distances, the propagated field is given by the fractional Fourier transform of a superposition of the initial field and of a reflected version of it. We also prove that for particular wavelengths, there is a revival and a splitting of the initial field. We apply this results, first to an initial field given by a Bessel function and show that it splits into two generalized Bessel functions, and second, to an Airy function. In both cases our results are compared with the exact numerical ones.