Effect of four-wave mixing on induced waveguiding

We study the waveguiding induced in a weak probe propagating in a medium of two-level atoms driven by a copropagating strong pump. We show that when the transverse profile of the pump exhibits solitonlike oscillations, similar oscillations can be induced in the transverse profile of the probe. When the probe waist size is initially narrower than that of the pump, the probe adjusts its width after a short propagation distance, to that of the pump. We show that the effect of the weak beam, which is created during propagation by four-wave mixing, on the waveguiding of the probe, becomes important when the medium is optically thick. This suggests that the importance of four-wave mixing in modifying induced waveguiding should be considered in other waveguiding schemes.