Order parameter fragmentation after a symmetry-breaking transition

As a nonlinear optical system consisting of a Kerr medium inserted in a fee dback loop is exposed to a light intensity growing linearly from below to a bove the threshold for pattern formation, the critical slowing down around threshold freezes the defect population. The measured number of defects imm ediately after the transition scales with the quench time as predicted by Z urek for a two-dimensional Ginzburg-Landau model. The further temporal evol ution of the defect number is in agreement with a simple annihilation model , once the drift of defects specific for our system is taken into account.