Search Results
Few-cycle 65-µJ pulses at 11.4 µm for ultrafast nonlinear longwave-infrared spectroscopy
2022, Fuertjes, Pia, Bock, Martin, Grafenstein, Lorenz von, Ueberschaer, Dennis, Griebner, Uwe, Elsaesser, Thomas
Low-energy excitations can provide insight into the basic ultrafast nonequilibrium dynamics of condensed matter. High-energy femtosecond pulses in the long-wavelength infrared are required to induce such processes, and can be generated in an optical parametric chirped pulse amplification (OPCPA) system comprising three GaSe stages. A femtosecond Cr:ZnS laser serves as the front-end, providing the seed for the 2.0-µm pump and the 2.4-µm signal pulses without nonlinear conversion processes. The OPCPA system is pumped at 2.05 µm by a picosecond Ho:YLF regenerative amplifier at a 1-kHz repetition rate. The recompressed idler pulses at 11.4 µm have a duration of 185 fs and an unprecedented energy of 65 µJ, corresponding to a pump-to-idler conversion efficiency of 1.2%. Nonlinear transmission experiments in the range of the L2 infrared band of liquid water demonstrate the potential of the pulses for nonlinear vibrational spectroscopy of liquids and solids.
Dimensioning of a multibeam coherent photonic beamformer fed by a phased array antenna
2018, Drummond, Miguel V., Duarte, Vanessa C., Albuquerque, André, Nogueira, Rogério N., Stampoulidis, Leontios, Winzer, Georg, Zimmermann, Lars, Clements, Stephen, Anzalchi, Javad
The design and dimensioning of a photonic-aided payload for a multi-beam high-throughput communications satellite is a complex problem in which the antenna, RF and photonic subsystems must be considered as a whole for achieving best performance with lowest mass and power consumption. In this paper, we propose and dimension the receiving stage of a communications satellite comprising a phased array antenna (PAA) feeding a multibeam photonic beamforming system (PBS). The PBS uses a single wavelength and resorts to heterodyne detection such that the retrieved beams are frequency downconverted. End-to-end system modeling shows that the complexity of the PAA and PBS can be traded-o for signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) or power consumption without compromising the beam width. The dimensioning of a realistic scenario is presented, showing that an SNR and beam crosstalk on the order of 20 dB are achievable with a total power consumption below 1 kW for a typical number of 100 antenna elements (AEs).
Signal and noise analysis for chiral structured illumination microscopy
2021, Huang, Shiang-Yu, Singh, Ankit Kumar, Huang, Jer-Shing
Recently, chiral structured illumination microscopy has been proposed to image fluorescent chiral domains at sub-wavelength resolution. Chiral structured illumination microscopy is based on the combination of structured illumination microscopy, fluorescence-detected circular dichroism, and optical chirality engineering. Since circular dichroism of natural chiral molecules is typically weak, the differential fluorescence is also weak and can be easily buried by the noise, hampering the fidelity of the reconstructed images. In this work, we systematically study the impact of the noise on the quality and resolution of chiral domain images obtained by chiral SIM. We analytically describe the signal-to-noise ratio of the reconstructed chiral SIM image in the Fourier domain and verify our theoretical calculations with numerical demonstrations. Accordingly, we discuss the feasibility of chiral SIM in different experimental scenarios and propose possible strategies to enhance the signal-to-noise ratio for samples with weak circular dichroism.
Chirp-control of resonant high-order harmonic generation in indium ablation plumes driven by intense few-cycle laser pulses
2018, Abdelrahman, Z., Khokhlova, M.A., Walke, D.J., Witting, T., Zair, A., Strelkov, V.V., Marangos, J.P., Tisch, J.W.G.
We have studied high-order harmonic generation (HHG) in an indium ablation plume driven by intense few-cycle laser pulses centered at 775 nm as a function of the frequency chirp of the laser pulse. We found experimentally that resonant emission lines between 19.7 eV and 22.3 eV (close to the 13th and 15th harmonic of the laser) exhibit a strong, asymmetric chirp dependence, with pronounced intensity modulations. The chirp dependence is reproduced by our numerical time-dependent Schrödinger equation simulations of a resonant HHG by the model indium ion. As demonstrated with our separate simulations of HHG within the strong field approximation, the resonance can be understood in terms of the chirp-dependent HHG photon energy coinciding with the energy of an autoionizing state to ground state transition with high oscillator strength. This supports the validity of the general theory of resonant four-step HHG in the few-cycle limit.
Evidence for “dark charge” from photoluminescence measurements in wide InGaN quantum wells
2023, Bercha, A., Trzeciakowski, W., Muziol, G., Tomm, J. W., Suski, T.
Wide (15-25 nm) InGaN/GaN quantum wells in LED structures were studied by time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy and compared with narrow (2.6 nm) wells in similar LED structures. Using below-barrier pulsed excitation in the microsecond range, we measured increase and decay of PL pulses. These pulses in wide wells at low-intensity excitation show very slow increase and fast decay. Moreover, the shape of the pulses changes when we vary the separation between them. None of these effects occurs for samples with narrow wells. The unusual properties of wide wells are attributed to the presence of “dark charge” i.e., electrons and holes in the ground states. Their wave functions are spatially separated and due to negligible overlap they do not contribute to emission. However, they screen the built-in field in the well very effectively so that excited states appear with significant overlap and give rise to PL. A simple model of recombination kinetics including “dark charge” explains the observations qualitatively.