Dynamical diversity of pulsating solitons in a fiber laser

Pulsating behavior is a universal phenomenon in versatile fields. In nonlinear dissipative systems, the solitons could also pulsate under proper conditions and show many interesting dynamics. However, the pulsation dynamics is generally concerned with single soliton case. Herein, by utilizing real-time spectroscopy technique, namely, dispersive Fourier-transform (DFT), we reveal the versatile categories of pulsating solitons in a fiber laser. In particular, the weak to strong explosive behaviors of pulsating soliton, as well as the rogue wave generation during explosions were observed. Moreover, the concept of soliton pulsation was extended to the multi-soliton case. It is found that the simultaneous pulsation of energy, separation and relative phase difference could be observed for solitons inside the molecule, while the pulsations of each individual in multi-soliton bunch could be regular or irregular. These findings would further enrich the ultrafast dynamics of dissipative solitons in nonlinear optical systems.