Analysis of self-written waveguides in photopolymers and photosensitive materials

Abstract
We develop a series expansion technique for analyzing the waveguides which can be self-written in photosensitive materials and photopolymers. Series expansions of the electric field amplitude and the refractive index distribution in the propagation distance are used to describe the primary eye, a feature that indicates that a waveguide is being formed in the material. We apply this technique to arbitrary incident beams and geometries, and we also take the material loss and saturation of the refractive index into account.