Disorder-induced light trapping enhanced by pulse collisions in one-dimensional nonlinear photonic crystals

•We numerically model interaction of pulses in disordered nonlinear photonic crystals.•Disorder-induced trapping is demonstrated for noninstantaneous Kerr nonlinearity.•Disorder-induced light trapping is more effective for two interacting pulses.•The cases of co- and counter-propagating pulses are analyzed.

We use numerical simulations to study interaction of co- and counter-propagating pulses in disordered multilayers with noninstantaneous Kerr nonlinearity. We propose a statistical argument for existence of the disorder-induced trapping which implies the dramatic rise of the probability of realization with low output energy in the structure with a certain level of disorder. This effect is much more pronounced in the case of two interacting pulses than in the single-pulse regime and does not occur in the strictly ordered system at the same intensity of the pulses. Therefore it cannot be explained simply as a result of increase in strength of nonlinear light-matter interaction.