This book has been prompted by our des ire to share with others our apprecia tion of the harmony and beauty in a particular sphere of modern optics known as "optical phase conjugation". Practical applications of the phase conjugated wave are likely to be far-reaching. Optical phase conjugation (OPC) combines in itself aesthetic and pragmatic attractiveness, a synthesis that has made OPC a subject of general attention. The figure presents the ap proximate rate of publications (number of articles per year) on OPC in the world literature for recent years, the lower curve denoting the work carried out in the USSR. The efforts of a large unofficial international collective have yielded an impressive result. 150 100 50 1975 1980 At present, the physical pro ces ses underlying various OPC methods are quite understandable, and it is the physics of OPC to which our book is devoted. Practical and scientific applications of phase-conjugated waves, which are of no less interest, have been touched upon in short, as major achievements in this sphere are a matter of the future. Today there are two main methods of OPC: i) by backward stimulated light scattering, ii) by four-wave mixing. Naturally, much attention is given to these methods in our book which, after the introductory Chap. 1, can be divided into two almost independent parts - Chaps. 2 - 5, and Chaps. 6 - 8.
