Harmonic Soliton Attractors Features and Encoding Applications in Ultrafast Fiber Lasers

Abstract This study systematically investigates the attractor characteristics of harmonic solitons in a passively mode-locked fiber laser. Through comprehensive analysis in both time and frequency domains, we examine the evolution of pulse width, spectral bandwidth, and energy across different harmonic orders. The results demonstrate typical soliton attractor behaviors, including attractiveness, dissipativity, and self-organization. In the transition regions between harmonic orders, breathing harmonic soliton states are captured using the time-stretched dispersive Fourier transform. By comparing the breathing dynamics with the stable states, the existence and self-organizing nature of soliton attractors are further confirmed. Finally, harmonic soliton attractors are employed as programmable light sources to achieve ternary optical coding.