ABSTRACT
The purpose of this Chapter is to present a brief review of the physics of supercontinuum generation in optical fiber under different conditions. Understanding the complex process of supercontinuum generation seems at first sight very difficult, but in fact the essential features of the spectral broadening can be broken down into a number of different contributing mechanisms. A key element, however, relates to understanding the fundamental principles of nonlinear fiber optics, and thus we begin describing the nonlinear and dispersive interactions that can occur when a light pulse is injected in a dielectric waveguide. Our approach follows that in ref. [1]. Further details of the fundamental nonlinear processes are also to be found in Chap. 5 of this volume.
