  The existence and stability of defect solitons in parity-time (PT) symmetric
optical lattices with nonlocal nonlinearity are reported. It is found that
nonlocality can expand the stability region of defect solitons. For positive or
zero defects, fundamental and dipole solitons can exist stably in the
semi-infinite gap and the first gap, respectively. For negative defects,
fundamental solitons can be stable in both the semi-infinite gap and the first
gap, whereas dipole solitons are unstable in the first gap. There exist a
maximum degree of nonlocal nonlinearity, above which the fundamental solitons
in the semi-infinite gap and the dipole solitons in the first gap do not exist
for negative defects. The influence of the imaginary part of the PT-symmetric
potentials on soliton stability is given. When the modulation depth of the
PT-symmetric lattices is small, defect solitons can be stable for positive and
zero defects, even if the PT-symmetric potential is above the phase transition
point.

Optics;Pattern Formation and Solitons