Rodrigo Lopez-Martens

Intense self-compressed, self-phase-stabilized few-cycle pulses at 2 μm from an optical filament

We report the compression of intense, carrier-envelope phase stable mid-IR pulses down to few-cycle duration using an optical filament. A filament in xenon gas is formed by using self-phase stabilized 330 microJ 55 fs pulses at 2 microm produced via difference-frequency generation in a Ti:sapphire-pumped optical parametric amplifier. The ultrabroadband 2 microm carrier-wavelength output is self-compressed below 3 optical cycles and has a 270 microJ pulse energy. The self-locked phase offset of the 2 microm difference-frequency field is preserved after filamentation. This is to our knowledge the first experimental realization of pulse compression in optical filaments at mid-IR wavelengths (lambda>0.8 microm).

Applications of ultrafast wavefront rotation in highly nonlinear optics

This paper provides an overview of ultrafast wavefront rotation of femtosecond laser pulses and its various applications in highly nonlinear optics, focusing on processes that lead to the generation of high-order harmonics and attosecond pulses. In this context, wavefront rotation can be exploited in different ways, to obtain new light sources for time-resolved studies, called ‘attosecond lighthouses’, to perform time-resolved measurements of nonlinear optical processes, using ‘photonic streaking’, or to track changes in the carrier–envelope relative phase of femtosecond laser pulses. The basic principles are explained qualitatively from different points of view, the experimental evidence obtained so far is summarized, and the perspectives opened by these effects are discussed.

Design and characterization of extreme-ultraviolet broadband mirrors for attosecond science.

A novel multilayer mirror was designed and fabricated based on a recently developed three-material technology aimed both at reaching reflectivities of about 20% and at controlling dispersion over a bandwidth covering photon energies between 35 and 50 eV. The spectral phase upon reflection was retrieved by measuring interferences in a two-color ionization process using high-order harmonics produced from a titanium: sapphire laser. We demonstrate the feasibility of designing and characterizing phase-controlled broadband optics in the extreme-ultraviolet domain, which should facilitate the manipulation of attosecond pulses for applications.

Compression of CEP-stable multi-mJ laser pulses down to 4?fs in long hollow fibers

Carrier envelope phase stable 4 fs near-IR pulses with 3 mJ energy were generated by spectral broadening of circularly polarized 8 mJ pulses in a differentially pumped 2 m long composite stretched exible hollow ber. The pulses were characterized using both second-harmonic generation frequency-resolved optical gating (SHG-FROG) and SHG d-scan methods

Relativistic electron beams driven by kHz single-cycle light pulses

Laser-plasma acceleration(1,2) is an emerging technique for accelerating electrons to high energies over very short distances. The accelerated electron bunches have femtosecond duration(3,4), making them particularly relevant for applications such as ultrafast imaging(5) or femtosecond X-ray generation(6,7). Current laser-plasma accelerators deliver 100 MeV (refs 8-10) to GeV (refs 11, 12) electrons using Joule-class laser systems that are relatively large in scale and have low repetition rates, with a few shots per second at best. Nevertheless, extending laser-plasma acceleration to higher repetition rates would be extremely useful for applications requiring lower electron energy. Here, we use single-cycle laser pulses to drive high-quality MeV relativistic electron beams, thereby enabling kHz operation and dramatic downsizing of the laser system. Numerical simulations indicate that the electron bunches are only similar to 1 fs long. We anticipate that the advent of these kHz femtosecond relativistic electron sources will pave the way to applications with wide impact, such as ultrafast electron diffraction in materials(13,14) with an unprecedented sub-10 fs resolution(15).

Energy-scalable temporal cleaning device for femtosecond laser pulses based on cross-polarized wave generation

We report on a compact energy-scalable device for generating high-fidelity femtosecond laser pulses based on spatial filtering through a hollow-core fiber followed by a nonlinear crystal for cross-polarized wave (XPW) generation. This versatile device is suited for temporal pulse cleaning over a wide range of input energies (from 0.1 to >10 mJ) and is successfully qualified on different ultrafast laser systems. Full characterization of the XPW output is presented. In particular, we demonstrate the generation of 1.6 mJ energy pulses starting from 11 mJ input pulse energy. The temporal contrast of the pulses is enhanced by more than 4 orders of magnitude. In addition, pulse shortening from 40 fs down to 15 fs Fourier-transform limit yields an overall peak-power transmission of up to 50%. This device not only serves as an integrated pulse contrast filter inside an ultrafast laser amplifier but also as a simple back-end solution for temporal post-compression of amplified pulses.

Macroscopic effects in attosecond pulse generation

We examine how the generation and propagation of high-order harmonics in a partly ionized gas medium affect their strength and synchronization. The temporal properties of the resulting attosecond pulses generated in long gas targets can be significantly influenced by macroscopic effects, in particular by the intensity in the medium and the degree of ionization which control the dispersion. Under some conditions, the use of gas targets longer than the absorption length can lead to the generation of compressed attosecond pulses. We show these macroscopic effects experimentally, using a 6 mm-long argon-filled gas cell as the generating medium.

Grism compressor for carrier-envelope phase-stable millijoule-energy chirped pulse amplifier lasers featuring bulk material stretcher.

We demonstrate compression of amplified carrier-envelope phase (CEP)-stable laser pulses using paired transmission gratings and high-index prisms, or grisms, with chromatic dispersion matching that of a bulk material pulse stretcher. Grisms enable the use of larger bulk stretching factors and thereby higher energy pulses with lower B-integral in a compact amplifier design suitable for long-term CEP control.

Passive coherent combining of CEP-stable few-cycle pulses from a temporally divided hollow fiber compressor

We demonstrate a robust passive coherent combining technique for post-compression of mJ energy CEP-stable laser pulses down to few-cycle duration in a gas-filled hollow-fiber. High combining efficiency is achieved using carefully oriented calcite plates.

Carrier-envelope-phase stable, high-contrast, double chirped-pulse-amplification laser system

We present the first carrier-envelope-phase stable chirped-pulse amplifier (CPA) featuring high temporal contrast for relativistic intensity laser-plasma interactions at 1 kHz repetition rate. The laser is based on a double-CPA architecture including cross-polarized wave (XPW) filtering technique and a high-energy grism-based compressor. The 8 mJ, 22 fs pulses feature 10⁻¹¹ temporal contrast at -20  ps and a carrier-envelope-phase drift of 240 mrad root mean square.