Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 78–81 (2000)Dynamics of Activated Escape and Its Observation in a Semiconductor LaserSee Also: Erratum Received 11 January 2000; published in the issue dated 3 July 2000 We report a direct experimental observation and provide a theory of the distribution of trajectories along which a fluctuating system moves over a potential barrier in escape from a metastable state. The experimental results are obtained for a semiconductor laser with optical feedback. The distribution of paths displays a distinct peak, which shows how the escaping system is most likely to move. We argue that the specific features of this distribution may give an insight into the nature of dropout events in lasers. © 2000 The American Physical Society URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.85.78
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevLett.85.78
PACS:
42.60.Mi, 05.20.-y, 05.40.-a, 42.55.Px
See AlsoErratum: J. Hales, A. Zhukov, R. Roy, and M. I. Dykman, Erratum: Dynamics of Activated Escape and Its Observation in a Semiconductor Laser [Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 78 (2000)], Phys. Rev. Lett. 86, 5405 (2001). |
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