Nonabelian sine-Gordon theory and its application to nonlinear optics

Abstract

Using a field theory generalization of the spinning top motion, we construct nonabelian generalizations of the sine-Gordon theory according to each symmetric spaces. A Lagrangian formulation of these generalized sine-Gordon theories is given in terms of a deformed gauged Wess-Zumino-Witten action which also accounts for integrably perturbed coset conformal field theories. As for physical applications, we show that they become precisely the effective field theories of self-induced transparency in nonlinear optics. This provides a dictionary between field theory and nonlinear optics.