Decay control via discrete-to-continuum coupling modulation in an optical waveguide system

Control of optical tunneling via modulation of the coupling to the continuum is experimentally reported in femtosecond laser written waveguide arrays. The experiment demonstrates for optical tunneling in photonic lattices the universal mechanism of decay control recently proposed for quantum systems by Kofman and Kurizki [Phys. Rev. Lett. 87, 270405 (2001)]. In particular, we prove that the formation of a dressed discrete-continuum bound state in the regime of fractional decay can be suppressed by dynamic modulation of discrete-to-continuum coupling.