We carry out the hidden structural symmetries embedded within a system comprising ultra-short pulses which propagate in optical nonlinear media.Based upon the Wahlquist Estabrook approach,we construct the Liealgebra valued connections associated to the previous symmetries while deriving their corresponding Lax-pairs,which are particularly useful in soliton theory.In the wake of previous results,we extend the above prolongation scheme to higher-dimensional systems from which a new (2+ 1)-dimensional ultra-short pulse equation is unveiled along with its inverse scattering formulation,the application of which are straightforward in nonlinear optics where an additional propagating dimension deserves some attention.