Extreme value events in self pulsing lasers

We report experimental and theoretical evidence of the existence of extreme value events (sometimes named “optical rogue waves”) in two types of lasers of widespread use, both belonging to the “laser with a saturable absorber” scenario. One is the Kerr-lens-mode-locking Ti:Sapphire (fs pulses) laser, the other one is the all-solid-state Cr+Nd:YAG (ns pulses) laser. Extreme value events are observed in some (not all) the chaotic regimes of both lasers. A well-tested theoretical model, based on a five variables iterative map, describes the observations for the former case in a complete way. The usual description in terms of rate equations apparently fails to predict extreme events for the latter, implying that this description must be improved.