Excitable solitons in a semiconductor laser with a saturable absorber

Self-pulsing cavity solitons may exist in a semiconductor laser with an intracavity saturable absorber. They show locally the passive Q-switching behavior that is typical of lasers with saturable absorbers in the plane-wave approximation. Here we show that excitable cavity solitons are also possible in a suitable parameter range and characterize their excitable dynamics and properties.