Conical emission by femtosecond pulses with different spectral bandwidths

Conical emission (CE) has been investigated experimentally by laser pulses with different pulse durations and spectral bandwidths. The results show that the overall CE curve will shift as the varying of spectral bandwidth of pump laser pulse. But for pump laser pulses which have same spectral bandwidth but different pulse duration, the CE angles will be same at the spectral region close to the pump wavelength while will be different at the spectral region far away from the pump wavelength. We have also fitted the measured CE angles with X-wave model. The calculated curves and the measured CE curves match reasonably well. The best fits indicate that the group velocity of the filament pulse may be greatly controlled by controlling the spectral bandwidth of pump laser pulse. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Conical Emission Patterns by Femtosecond Pulses with Different Spectral Bandwidths

Different conical emission (CE) patterns are obtained experimentally at various incident powers and beam sizes of pump laser pulses with pulse durations of 7 fs, 44 fs and 100 fs. The results show that it is the incident power but not the incident power density that determines a certain CE pattern. In addition, the critical powers for similar CE patterns are nearly the same for the laser pulses with the same spectral bandwidth. Furthermore, as far as a certain CE pattern is concerned, the wider the spectral bandwidth of pump laser pulse is, the higher the critical power is. This will hopefully provide new insights for the generation of CE pattern in optical medium.

Spectral analysis and control to obtain sub-5 fs pulses by femtosecond filamentation

A spectral-filter method is numerically demonstrated to obtain sub-5 fs pulses by using femtosecond filamentation in fused silica. Instead of employing spectral phase compensation, by properly employing a high-pass filter to select the broadened high-frequency spectra that are located almost in phase in the tailing edge of the self-compressed pulses owing to self-steepening, as short as single-cycle pulses can be obtained. For instance, for an input pulse with a duration of 50 fs and energy 2.2 mu J, the minimum pulse duration can reach to similar to 4 fs (about 1.5 cycles) by applying a proper spectral filter. (C) 2008 Optical Society of America

Spectral evolution of angularly resolved third-order harmonic generation by infrared femtosecond laser-pulse filamentation in air

We experimentally investigate the evolution of an angularly resolved spectrum of third harmonic generated by infrared femtosecond laser pulse filamentation in air. We show that at low pump intensity, phase matching between the fundamental and third-harmonic waves dominates the nonlinear optical effect and induces a ring structure of the third-harmonic beam, whereas at high pump intensity, the dispersion properties of air begin to affect the angular spectrum, leading to the formation of a nonlinear X wave at third harmonic.

Phase control of higher spectral components in the presence of a static electric field

We investigate the higher spectral component generations driven by a few-cycle laser pulse in a dense medium when a static electric field is present. Our results show that, when assisted by a static electric field, the dependence of the transmitted laser spectrum on the carrier-envelope phase (CEP) is significantly increased. Continuum and distinct peaks can be achieved by controlling the CEP of the few-cycle ultrashort laser pulse. Such a strong variation is due to the fact that the presence of the static electric field modifies the waveform of the combined electric field, which further affects the spectral distribution of the generated higher spectral components.

Spectral distributions of harmonic generation from electron oscillation driven by intense femtosecond laser pulses

The characteristics of harmonic radiation due to electron oscillation driven by an intense femtosecond laser pulse are analyzed considering a single electron model. An interesting modulated structure of the spectrum is observed and analyzed for different polarization. Higher order harmonic radiations are possible for a sufficiently intense driving laser pulse. We have shown that for a realistic pulsed photon beam, the spectrum of the radiation is red shifted as well as broadened because of changes in the longitudinal velocity of the electrons during the laser pulse. These effects are more pronounced at higher laser intensities giving rise to higher order harmonics that eventually leads to a continuous spectrum. Numerical simulations have further shown that by increasing the laser pulse width broadening of the high harmonic radiations can be limited. (C) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Cluster explosion investigated by linearly chirped spectral scattering of an expanding plasma sphere

Femtosecond explosive processes of argon clusters irradiated by linearly chirped ultraintense laser pulses have been investigated by 90 degrees side spectral scattering. The spectral redshift and blueshift, which correlate with the cluster explosion processes have been measured for negatively and positively chirped driving laser pulses, respectively. The evolution of the heated-cluster polarizability indicates that the core of the cluster is shielded from the laser field in the beginning of the explosion and enhanced scattering occurs after the fast explosion initiates. Evidence of resonant heating is found from the coincidence of enhanced scattering with enhanced absorption measured using the transmitted spectra. Anomalously large-size clusters with very low gas density have been observed in this way and can be used as clean and important cluster targets.

Spectral technique for measuring hyperfine structure of atoms

A new spectral technique for measuring the hyperfine structure of atoms is reported. A divergent atomic beam and a divergent laser beam are crossed. Because of the Doppler effect, the hyperfine structure of atomic levels will be directly displayed in the interaction region in the form of spatially resolved fluorescence arc bands. By measuring the spatial-fluorescence intensity distribution, it is possible to obtain the hyperfine splittings of atomic levels. Basic principles and experimental results are given.

Quantum interference effects of two coherent population trapping states on the atomic spectral lines of a F-e=0 -> F-g=1 transition

We investigate the fluorescence spectrum in a nearly degenerate atomic system of a F-e = 0 -> F-g = 1 transition by analytically solving Schrodinger equations. An ultranarrow fluorescence spectral line in between the two coherent population trapping windows has been found. Our analytic solutions clearly show the origin of the ultranarrow spectral line. Due to quantum interference effects between two coherent population trapping states, the width and intensity of the central spectral line can be controlled by an external magnetic field. Such an effect may be used to detect a magnetic field.

Manipulating spectral anomalies of focused pulses in a medium with electromagnetically induced transparency

We study the possibility of manipulating the focusing properties of a medium with electromagnetically induced transparency. In the focal region of focused ultraslow light pulses, the spectral anomalous behaviors can be actively modified by varying the control field intensity. Unlike the case in free space, we find in slow light focusing that the spectrum bandwidth of the incident field needed to produce observable spectral changes can be reduced by several orders. Numerical simulations with accessible parameters clearly show that spectral anomalies of focused mu s pulses are observable.

Cross spectral purity and its influence on ghost imaging experiments

Pseudo-thermal light has been widely used in ghost imaging experiments. In order to understand the differences between the pseudo-thermal source and thermal source, we propose a method to investigate whether a light source has cross spectral purity (CSP), and experimentally measure the cross spectral properties of the pseudo-thermal light source in near-field and far-field zones. Moreover we present a theoretical analysis of the cross spectral influence on ghost imaging. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.