Characterization of broadband few-cycle laser pulses with the d-scan technique

Miranda, Miguel; Arnold, Cord L.; Fordell, Thomas; Silva, Francisco; Alonso, Benjamín González; Weigand, Rudolf; L’Huillier, Anne; Crespo, Helder

doi:10.1364/oe.20.018732

Cited by 200 publications

(170 citation statements)

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“…Pulses from a Femtopower Compact Pro amplifier were compressed to 5-fs duration and 750-μJ pulse energy using self-phase modulation in a neon-filled (2-bar) hollow-core fiber and a chirped mirror compressor (optics from Ultrafast Innovations). The compressed pulses had a continuous spectrum spanning from 400 to 1,000 nm and were characterized using dispersion scan [Sphere Photonics (51)] to have a duration of 4.9 fs. The 1-kHz repetition rate was reduced to 100 Hz using an optical chopper to avoid sample damage, and the beam was split into two arms using an 80-20% broadband beam splitter.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tracking the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO ₂ with few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy

Jager

Ott

Kraus

et al. 2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

132

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Coulomb correlations can manifest in exotic properties in solids, but how these properties can be accessed and ultimately manipulated in real time is not well understood. The insulator-to-metal phase transition in vanadium dioxide (VO 2 ) is a canonical example of such correlations. Here, few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy (FXTAS) at the vanadium M 2,3 edge is used to track the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO 2 . This technique allows observation of the bulk material in real time, follows the photoexcitation process in both the insulating and metallic phases, probes the subsequent relaxation in the metallic phase, and measures the phasetransition dynamics in the insulating phase. An understanding of the VO 2 absorption spectrum in the extreme UV is developed using atomic cluster model calculations, revealing V 3+ /d 2 character of the vanadium center. We find that the insulator-to-metal phase transition occurs on a timescale of 26 ± 6 fs and leaves the system in a longlived excited state of the metallic phase, driven by a change in orbital occupation. Potential interpretations based on electronic screening effects and lattice dynamics are discussed. A Mott-Hubbard-type mechanism is favored, as the observed timescales and d 2 nature of the vanadium metal centers are inconsistent with a Peierls driving force. The findings provide a combined experimental and theoretical roadmap for using time-resolved extreme UV spectroscopy to investigate nonequilibrium dynamics in strongly correlated materials.he Coulomb interaction of charges in a solid depends sensitively on local screening, bonding structure, and orbital occupancy. These electronic correlation effects are known to manifest themselves in unusual properties, such as superconductivity, colossal magnetoresistance, and insulator-to-metal phase transitions (IMTs), which can be switched on or off via small perturbations. Understanding if and how these correlation-driven properties can be manipulated in real time will open the door to using these materials as ultrafast photonic switches and will establish the electronic speed limits for next-generation devices (1-3).Following the real-time dynamics of carrier interactions necessarily requires time-resolving the excitation and relaxation of electron correlations. Studies at longer timescales are complicated by simultaneous effects of structural distortion together with carrier screening and thermalization. In contrast, few-femtosecond extreme UV absorption spectroscopy (FXTAS) provides temporal resolution close to the Fourier limit for single-photon excitation with broadband visible light. It has the capability to separate electronic and structural effects on the basis of their intrinsic timescales and can isolate early-time electronic dynamics spectroscopically via atom-specific core-level electronic transitions (4, 5). Previous few-femtosecond and attosecond measurements of electron dynamics in solid-state systems have been restricted to simple band insulators or semiconductors and...

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tracking the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO ₂ with few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy

Jager

Ott

Kraus

et al. 2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

132

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“…The pulses are characterized online using an integrated dscan device directly under vacuum [14]. At optimal compression, we generate 3.5fs pulses (1.3 cycle at 750nm central wavelength) with 3.5mJ energy, corresponding to 1TW peak power.…”

Section: Futurementioning

confidence: 99%

Ultrafast Optics 2017

Dorrer¹,

Durfee²,

Fry³

et al. 2018

Ultrafast Optics 2017

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Publication of record for individual papers is online in the SPIE Digital Library. SPIEDigitalLibrary.orgPaper Numbering: Proceedings of SPIE follow an e-First publication model. A unique citation identifier (CID) number is assigned to each article at the time of publication. Utilization of CIDs allows articles to be fully citable as soon as they are published online, and connects the same identifier to all online and print versions of the publication. SPIE uses a seven-digit CID article numbering system structured as follows: The first five digits correspond to the SPIE volume number.  The last two digits indicate publication order within the volume using a Base 36 numbering system employing both numerals and letters. These two-number sets start with 00, 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 0A, 0B … 0Z, followed by 10-1Z, 20-2Z, etc. The CID Number appears on each page of the manuscript. IntroductionIn October 2017, Ultrafast Optics (UFO) celebrated its 11th conference and 20th year. Keeping with the long tradition of hosting UFO in special locations, the conference was held in Jackson, Wyoming, gateway to Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks, with 160 attendees from 18 countries.The field of ultrafast science expanded significantly in the 1990s strongly boosted by the development of chirped pulse amplification and Ti:sapphire based ultrafast lasers. Commercially available laser systems enabled researchers around the world to make rapid advances in ultrafast research in physics, chemistry, materials science, biology, electronics, engineering, and medicine. Conferences such as CLEO and Ultrafast Phenomena were the natural forum for discussion of the science and application of these new sources. SPIE hosted a meeting as part of Photonics West that covered some of the technology aspects of ultrafast laser sources, but there was no dedicated conference focused on the science and technology of the generation, manipulation, and measurement of ultrafast laser pulses. It was, however, the sense of the community that the topic was of sufficient interest and breadth to justify a dedicated, stand-alone topical meeting.The planners of the first UFO conference in Monterey, California self-organized all aspects of the conference, counting on active engagement from the international community of ultrafast laser research groups and the financial support of several laser and optical component manufacturers. The conference operated as a weeklong, single session meeting to enable full participation of all attendees for every presentation. The sense of community was enhanced by social activities and excursions to enable casual interactions among the attendees. The success of this original formula has been duplicated over the past two decades, with the conference switching between locations in North America, Europe, and Asia.In 2017, the field of ultrafast optics continues to show rapid fundamental and technological development with significant achievements reported in numerous areas including petawatt lasers, coherent comb...

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“…This necessarily means that they are insensitive to time-invariant parameters of the field. The well-established methods of the past two decades, including FROG [11], SPIDER [12], MIIPS [13], and D-Scan [14], have played important roles in the development of ultrafast laser sources and for characterizing laser pulses used in a wide range of experiments. However, they suffer from a number of limitations in their capabilities: (i) they measure only the spectral/temporal intensity and dispersion/chirp, not the full electric field, including the carrier-envelope phase (CEP); (ii) they cannot measure the relative phase across spectral nulls without an auxiliary field with a bandwidth that spans the null [15,16]; (iii) for ultrabroad bandwidth pulses, the bandwidth and efficiency of the measurement is limited by the requirement to use a nonlinear material to act as a time-stationary filter; and (iv) the pulse is rarely measured in situ, which necessitates a careful calibration of the linear and nonlinear space-time propagation of the pulse from the diagnostic to the site of the experiment.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Attosecond Sampling of Arbitrary Optical Waveforms

Wyatt

Witting

Schiavi

et al. 2017

Frontiers in Optics 2017

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Advances in the generation of ultrashort laser pulses, and the emergence of new research areas such as attosecond science, nanoplasmonics, coherent control, and multidimensional spectroscopy, have led to the need for a new class of ultrafast metrology that can measure the electric field of complex optical waveforms spanning the ultraviolet to the infrared. Important examples of such waveforms are those produced by spectral control of ultrabroad bandwidth pulses, or by Fourier synthesis. These are typically tailored for specific purposes, such as to increase the photon energy and flux of high-harmonic radiation, or to control dynamical processes by steering electron dynamics on subcycle time scales. These applications demand a knowledge of the full temporal evolution of the field. Conventional pulse measurement techniques that provide estimates of the relative temporal or spectral phase are unsuited to measure such waveforms. Here we experimentally demonstrate a new, all-optical method for directly measuring the electric field of arbitrary ultrafast optical waveforms. Our method is based on high-harmonic generation (HHG) driven by a field that is the collinear superposition of the waveform to be measured with a stronger probe laser pulse. As the delay between the pulses is varied, we show that the field of the unknown waveform is mapped to energy shifts in the high-harmonic spectrum, allowing a direct, accurate, and rapid retrieval of the electric field with subcycle temporal resolution at the location of the HHG.Published by The Optical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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Characterization of broadband few-cycle laser pulses with the d-scan technique

Cited by 200 publications

References 38 publications

Tracking the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO ₂ with few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy

Tracking the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO ₂ with few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy

Ultrafast Optics 2017

Attosecond Sampling of Arbitrary Optical Waveforms

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Characterization of broadband few-cycle laser pulses with the d-scan technique

Cited by 200 publications

References 38 publications

Tracking the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO 2 with few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy

Tracking the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO 2 with few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy

Ultrafast Optics 2017

Attosecond Sampling of Arbitrary Optical Waveforms

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Product

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About

Tracking the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO ₂ with few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy

Tracking the insulator-to-metal phase transition in VO ₂ with few-femtosecond extreme UV transient absorption spectroscopy