Incoherently coupled soliton pairs in nonlocal nonlinear media

We show that incoherently coupled soliton pairs can exist in nonlocal Kerr-type nonlinear media. Such solitons can propagate in bright-bright, dark-dark, and gray-gray configurations. When the nonlocal nonlinearity is absent, these bright-bright and dark-dark soliton pairs are those observed previously in local Kerr-type nonlinear media. Our analysis indicates that for a self-focusing nonlinearity the intensity full width half maximum (FWHM) of the bright-bright pair components increases with the degree of nonlocality of the nonlinear response, whereas for a self-defocusing nonlinearity the intensity FWHM of the dark-dark and gray-gray pair components decreases with the increase in the degree of nonlocality of the nonlinear response. The stability of these soliton pairs has been investigated numerically and it has been found that they are stable.