Limits of existence of wavefront reversal in stimulated light scattering

An analysis is made of the wavefront reversal (or reproduction) in pump beams with a highly developed transverse interference structure. When the difference between the pump and scattered field wavelengths is small, diffraction improves the reproduction process. On the other hand, pulling of the scattered field into the cores of diffraction filaments with high pump intensities (as in serpentine active microwaveguides) results in deterioration of the reproduction process but it increases the scattered-field increment. A calculation is made of the serpentine effect using a power-series expansion in terms of the intensity of a monochromatic pump beam with a randomly inhomogeneous transverse structure.