Weak phase noise present on an optical field can be amplified by a self-focusing nonlinearity ($n_2>0$) and form intense “rogue-wave” features. Here, we study the effect of the coherence length (or grain size) of this phase noise on the likelihood of rogue-wave formation in the presence of a self-focusing nonlinearity. We show that while the likelihood of rogue-wave formation increases with laser power when the coherence length is only slightly smaller than the beam diameter, the likelihood is minimally affected by a change in laser power when the coherence length is significantly smaller than the beam diameter. Our study provides insight into the interaction of nonlinearity with phase instabilities on a field and could be useful in applications such as reducing the effect of turbulence-induced breakup of intense laser beams, and developing radiance limiters to reduce the focusable power in a beam.

• Received 11 October 2022
• Accepted 19 January 2024

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.6.013174

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

Published by the American Physical Society