Symmetry-breaking dynamics of the modulational instability spectrum

In this work, we demonstrate both numerically and experimentally an a priori unexpected dynamics of this symmetry-breaking process that occurs in low dispersion optical fibers. We show in particular that the induced spectral asymmetry does not decrease monotonically with the dispersion value but exhibits extrema and a reversal of the asymmetry due to coherent interactions between DWs and MI side lobes.