Periodic and rational solutions of the reduced Maxwell-Bloch equations

We investigate the reduced Maxwell-Bloch (RMB) equations which describe the propagation of short optical pulses in dielectric materials with resonant non-degenerate transitions. The general Nth-order periodic solutions are provided by means of the Darboux transformation, and from two different limiting cases of the obtained general periodic solutions, the Nth-order degenerate periodic and Nth-order rational solutions containing several free parameters with compact determinant representations are derived, respectively. Explicit expressions of these solutions from first to second order are presented. Typical nonlinear wave patterns for the four components of the RMB equations such as single-peak, double-peak-double-dip, double-peak and single-dip structures in the second-order rational solutions are shown. This kind of the rational solutions correspond to rogue waves in the reduced Maxwell-Bloch equations.