Reverse saturable absorption of short polarized light pulses

We describe the absorption characteristics of polarized light pulses of short temporal duration in media with a ground state absorption cross section and large excited state absorption cross section. The effects of rotational diffusion, pulse depletion, finite pulse propagation time, and transition dipole moment orientation are properly treated. Significant enhancement of the reverse saturation due to excited state absorption results when the ground and excited state absorption dipole moments are parallel.