Destruction of Anderson localization by a weak nonlinearity

Phys Rev Lett. 2008 Mar 7;100(9):094101. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.100.094101. Epub 2008 Mar 4.

Abstract

We study numerically the spreading of an initially localized wave packet in a one-dimensional discrete nonlinear Schrödinger lattice with disorder. We demonstrate that above a certain critical strength of nonlinearity the Anderson localization is destroyed and an unlimited subdiffusive spreading of the field along the lattice occurs. The second moment grows with time proportional, variant t alpha, with the exponent alpha being in the range 0.3-0.4. For small nonlinearities the distribution remains localized in a way similar to the linear case.