Formation and interaction of spatial solitons in a photorefractive medium with drift and diffusion components of the nonlinear response

Exact self-bending soliton solutions for the equation of a beam in a photorefractive medium with diffusion and drift components of the nonlinear response are obtained and their stability is analysed. It is shown that the interaction of solitons in a medium with nonlocal nonlinearity is accompanied by energy exchange, which causes, as a rule, the annihilation of one of the solitons.