Optical elliptic breathers in isotropic nonlocal nonlinear media

We investigate the propagation dynamics of elliptic Gaussian breathers without and with orbital angular momentum (OAM) in thermal nonlocal nonlinear media with both linear and nonlinear isotropy. The beamwidths and intensity of the elliptic breather without OAM, and the beamwidths and rotation angle of the elliptic breather with the critical OAM are analytically discussed in details. In experiment, the OAM-free elliptic beam is observed to oscillate and cannot form an elliptic soliton for any input power. By contrast, the elliptic beam carrying the critical OAM can keep its ellipticity changeless during the propagation and evolve into a spiralling elliptic soliton at the critical power. Specifically, in the vicinity of the critical power, the rotation angle of the spiralling elliptic beam can be controlled linearly by the input power and exceed pi/2, while its beamwidths and ellipticity remain unchanged. Such a power-controllable, profile-preserving spiralling elliptic beam may provide potential applications in all-optical manipulation. (C) 2022 Optica Publishing Group under the terms of the Optica Open Access Publishing Agreement