We introduce a new kind of soliton-impurity interaction by examining the phenomena generated by colliding multiple-wave solitons in quadratic nonlinear media with localized perturbations. We examine different models for the impurities and find regimes of soliton self-bouncing, tunneling, and trapping, depending on the impurity type. We show that the transition between the different regimes is governed, e.g., by the soliton energy, and in one of the models we derive a Snell-type law for the process. We propose an optical setting to observe the soliton bouncing predicted.

• Received 30 December 1997

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.81.790