This volume is a collection of experimental and theoretical papers presented at the international "Topical Meeting on Optical Bistability," held at the University of Rochester, June 15-17, 1983, sponsored jointly by the Air Force Office of Scientific Re search; the Army Research Office; and the Optical Society of America. The Conference, which had 150 attendees, overlapped (on June 15) with the Fifth Rochester Conference on Coherence and Quantum Optics with two joint sessions. Some of the topics cover ed in this volume are also treated io the Proceedings of that Conference. Since the last international conference on Optical Bistability, held in Asheville, North Carolina, June 3-5, 1980, there have been new and important fundamental advances in the field. This is borne out in papers in this volume dealing with optical chaos and period doubling bifurcations leading to chaos as well as the report of results of an experiment using a very simple system exhibiting ab sorptive optical bistability in a ring cavity using optically pump ed sodium atoms, which was successfully analyzed quantitatively by a simple theory. Other advances discussed here include the ob servation of optical bistability due to the effect of radiation pressure on one mirror of a fabry-Perot cavity. and the prediction of mirrorless intrinsic opittal bistability due to the local field correction incorporated into the Maxwell-Bloch formulation. Advances in optical bistability in semiconductors relate closer to actual device applications."

This is a collection of papers presented at the Topical Meeting on Optical BistabiJity (OB3) held December 2-4,1985 in Tucson, Arizona. The increase in attendance to almost 200 shows that interest continues to grow in the sub ject of optical bistability (OB) and its wider implications both in application to "optical digital computing" and to basic physics, notably instabilities and spatial effects. The maturing of the field is evidenced by the fact that the number of experimental papers has caught up with the number of theoretical ones. These trends were already apparent in OB2 and the 1984 Royal Society Meeting on Optical Bistabilty, Dynamical Nonlinearity and Photonic Logic. Progress in experiment.al topics included guided-wave OB, mostly ther mal, picol'econd switching, studies on quite a number of new materials, op tical computing, and pattern recognition using arrays of nonlinear etalons. Theoretical progress ranged from rather practical calculations on device per formance, noise effects on switching, and transverse and longitudinal spatial effects to fundamental studies of dynamics, instabilities, and chaos. The Conference also included both theoretical ideas on optical computer archit.ecture and intrinsic OB circuit elements such as as full adder as well as t.he first demonstration of an intrinsic optical circuit in the form of a cas cadable loop with bufferd st.ores. A first demostration of a simple pattern recognition algorithm using 2-D arrays of spots on a ZnSe int.erference filter was reported."

Nonlinear photonics is the name given to the use of nonlinear optical devices for the generation, communication, processing, or analysis of information. This book is a progress report on research into practical applications of such devices. At present, modulation, switching, routing, decision-making, and detection in photonic systems are all done with electronics and linear optoelectronic devices. However, this may soon change, as nonlinear optical devices, e.g. picosecond samplers and switches, begin to complement optoelectonic devices. The authors succinctly summarize past accomplishments in this field and point to hopes for the future, making this an ideal book for newcomers or seasoned researchers wanting to design and perfect nonlinear optical devices and to identify applications in photonic systems.