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Now showing 1 - 8 of 8
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    Transient pulse compression at a group velocity horizon
    (Berlin : Weierstraß-Institut für Angewandte Analysis und Stochastik, 2015) Babushkin, Ihar; Amiranashvili, Shalva; Brée, Carsten; Morgner, Uwe; Steinmeyer, Günter; Demircan, Ayhan
    Group-velocity matched cross-phase modulation between a fundamental soliton and a dispersive wave-packet has been previously suggested for optical switching applications similar to an optical transistor. Moreover, the nonlinear interaction in the resulting groupvelocity horizon can be exploited for adiabatic compression of the soliton down into the fewcycle regime. Here we show that both mechanisms can be combined. In such a transient compressor, parameters of the dispersive wave may then serve to actively control the soliton compression and adjust the pulse duration in the presence of disturbances. While a certain amount of control is already enabled by the delay between soliton and dispersive wave, the means of controlling the compression process are substantially enhanced by additionally manipulating the chirp of the dispersive wave. Moreover, controlling the chirp of the dispersive wave also enables correction for limitations of the compression scheme due to a self-frequency shift of the soliton or for uncompensated dispersion in the scheme. This substantially widens the practicality of the compression scheme and other applications of the highly efficient nonlinear interaction at the group-velocity horizon.
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    Non-instantaneous polarization dynamics in dielectric media
    (Berlin : Weierstraß-Institut für Angewandte Analysis und Stochastik, 2014) Hofmann, Michael; Hyyti, Janne; Birkholz, Simon; Bock, Martin; Das, Susanta K.; Grunwald, Rüdiger; Hoffmann, Mathias; Nagy, Tamas; Demircan, Ayhan; Jupé, Marco; Ristau, Detlev; Morgner, Uwe; Brée, Carsten; Woerner, Michael; Elsaesser, Thomas; Steinmeyer, Günter
    Third-order optical nonlinearities play a vital role for generation1,2 and characterization 3-5 of some of the shortest optical pulses to date, for optical switching applications6,7, and for spectroscopy8,9. In many cases, nonlinear optical effects are used far off resonance, and then an instantaneous temporal response is expected. Here, we show for the first time resonant frequency-resolved optical gating measurements1012 that indicate substantial nonlinear polarization relaxation times up to 6.5 fs in dielectric media, i.e., significantly beyond the shortest pulses directly available from commercial lasers. These effects are among the fastest effects observed in ultrafast spectroscopy. Numerical solutions of the time-dependent Schrödinger equation13,14 are in excellent agreement with experimental observations. The simulations indicate that pulse generation and characterization in the ultraviolet may be severely affected by this previously unreported effect. Moreover, our approach opens an avenue for application of frequency-resolved optical gating as a highly selective spectroscopic probe in high-field physics.
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    Accelerated rogue solitons triggered by background radiation
    (Berlin : Weierstraß-Institut für Angewandte Analysis und Stochastik, 2015) Demircan, Ayhan; Amiranashvili, Shalva; Brée, Carsten; Morgner, Uwe; Steinmeyer, Günter
    [no abstract available]
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    Symmetry breaking and strong persistent plasma currents via resonant destabilization of atoms
    (Berlin : Weierstraß-Institut für Angewandte Analysis und Stochastik, 2017) Brée, Carsten; Hofmann, Michael; Babushkin, Ihar; Demircan, Ayhan; Morgner, Uwe; Kosareva, Olga G.; Savelev, Andrei B.; Husakou, Anton; Ivanov, Misha
    The ionization rate of an atom in a strong optical field can be resonantly enhanced by the presence of long-living atomic levels (so called Freeman resonances). This process is most prominent in the multiphoton ionization regime meaning that ionization event takes many optical cycles. Nevertheless, here we show that these resonances can lead to fast subcycle-scale plasma buildup at the resonant values of the intensity in the pump pulse. The fast buildup can break the cycletocycle symmetry of the ionization process, resulting in generation of persistent macroscopic plasma currents which remain after the end of the pulse. This, in turn, gives rise to a broadband radiation of unusual spectral structure forming a comb from terahertz (THz) to visible. This radiation contains fingerprints of the attosecond electronic dynamics in Rydberg states during ionization.
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    Impact of spatial inhomogeneities on on-axis pulse reconstruction in femtosecond filaments
    (Berlin : Weierstraß-Institut für Angewandte Analysis und Stochastik, 2014) Brée, Carsten; Kretschmar, Martin; Nagy, Tamas; Kurz, Heiko G.; Morgner, Uwe; Kovačev, Milutin
    We demonstrate a strong influence of the spatial beam profile on the vacuum-propagated on-axis pulse shapes for a femtosecond filament in argon. The effects can be minimized by transmitting the filament into the far-field by a laser-drilled pinhole setup. Using this method, we can monitor the pulse compression dynamics along the entire longitudinal extension of the filament, including the ionization-induced plasma channel.
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    Adjustable pulse compression scheme for generation of few-cycle pulses in the mid-infrared
    (Berlin : Weierstraß-Institut für Angewandte Analysis und Stochastik, 2014) Demircan, Ayhan; Amiranashvili, Shalva; Brée, Carsten; Morgner, Uwe; Steinmeyer, Günter
    An novel adjustable adiabatic soliton compression scheme is presented, enabling a coherent pulse source with pedestal-free few-cycle pulses in the infrared or mid-infrared regime. This scheme relies on interaction of a dispersive wave and a soliton copropagating at nearly identical group velocities in a fiber with enhanced infrared transmission. The compression is achieved directly in one stage, without necessity of an external compensation scheme. Numerical simulations are employed to demonstrate this scheme for silica and fluoride fibers, indicating ultimate limitations as well as the possibility of compression down to the single-cycle regime. Such output pulses appear ideally suited as seed sources for parametric amplification schemes in the mid-infrared.
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    Supercontinuum generation by multiple scatterings at a group velocity horizon
    (Berlin : Weierstraß-Institut für Angewandte Analysis und Stochastik, 2014) Demircan, Ayhan; Amiranashvli, Shalva; Brée, Carsten; Morgner, Uwe; Steinmeyer, Günter
    A new scheme for supercontinuum generation covering more than one octave and exhibiting extraordinary high coherence properties has recently been proposed in Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 233901 (2013). The scheme is based on two-pulse collision at a group velocity horizon between a dispersive wave and a soliton. Here we demonstrate that the same scheme can be exploited for the generation of supercontinua encompassing the entire transparency region of fused silica, ranging from 300 to 2300nm. At this bandwidth extension, the Raman effect becomes detrimental, yet may be compensated by using a cascaded collision process. Consequently, the high degree of coherence does not degrade even in this extreme scenario.
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    Regularizing aperiodic cycles of resonant radiation in filament light bullets
    (Berlin : Weierstraß-Institut für Angewandte Analysis und Stochastik, 2017) Brée, Carsten; Babushkin, Ihar; Morgner, Uwe; Demircan, Ayhan
    We demonstrate an up to now unrecognized and very effective mechanism which prevents filament collapse and allows persistent self-guiding propagation retaining larg portion of the optical energy on-axis over unexpected long distances. The key ingredient is the possibility of leaking continuously energy into the normal dispersion regime via emission of resonant radiation. The frequency of the radiation is determined by the dispersion dynamically modified by photo-generated plasma, thus allowing to excite new frequencies in the spectral ranges which are otherwise difficult to access.