E. Lantz et al., TRANSMISSION OF A GAUSSIAN-BEAM THROUGH A NONLINEAR THIN-FILM NEAR THE TOTAL-REFLECTION STATE, Journal of the Optical Society of America. B, Optical physics, 11(2), 1994, pp. 347-354
We show by numerical simulation that a small-radius Gaussian beam impi
nging upon a thin nonlinear film can switch from a total reflection st
ate to a transmission state if the Kerr nonlinearity is positive. The
phenomenon is nonresonant and is similar to interface switching. On th
e other hand, great differences from previous plane-wave models appear
. Extension of these results to wider beams seems possible according t
o qualitative and quantitative arguments. For a negative nonlinearity
the thin film acts as a Limiter of the transmitted intensity. For wide
beams results are similar to plane-wave results.