Spontaneous and engineered transformations of topological structures in nonlinear media with gain and loss (1907.06180v1)

Abstract: In contrast to conservative systems, in nonlinear media with gain and loss the dynamics of localized topological structures can exhibit unique features that can be controlled externally. We propose a robust mechanism to perform topological transformations changing characteristics of dissipative vortices and their complexes in a controllable way. We show that a properly chosen control carries out the evolution of dissipative structures to regime with spontaneous transformation of the topological excitations or drives generation of vortices with control over the topological charge.