Defect-controlled transverse localization of light in disordered photonic lattices

We study numerically Anderson localization of light in a disordered photonic lattice containing vacancy defects of different length. The influence of Kerr nonlinearity and disorder level on the transverse localization of light in different triangular lattice geometries is discussed. We demonstrate both suppression and enhancement of light localization in the presence of defects of different size, depending on the disorder level and the strength of the nonlinearity. We find that, in the linear regime, localization is more pronounced in the lattice with the simplest defect type-the single vacancy. In a strongly focusing nonlinear regime, the presence of all defect kinds enhances localization, as compared to the case with no defects. In the defocusing nonlinear regime, a suppression of localization in the presence of all defect types is demonstrated, as compared to the localization in the lattice without defects. In the end, the effect of input beam width on various regimes of Anderson localization is discussed.