ABSTRACT
Optical limiting in highly oriented lead magnesium niobate-lead titanate rhombohedral and tetragonal multilayers has been investigated using nanosecond laser pulses at 1.064 μm wavelength. Limiting threshold for the two such multilayers having a period of 20 and 218 nm was determined at the level ∼220 μJ/pulse. Nonlinear optical scattering from domain walls was used to explain the observed limiting behavior. Possible formation of nonlinear refraction grating under a strong light field superposing to the periodic multilayer structure was also discussed.