Table-top interferometry on extreme time and wavelength scales

Abstract

Short-pulse metrology and dynamic studies in the extreme ultraviolet (XUV) spectral range greatly benefit from interferometric measurements. In this contribution a Michelson-type all-reflective split-and-delay autocorrelator operating in a quasi amplitude splitting mode is presented. The autocorrelator works under a grazing incidence angle in a broad spectral range (10 nm – 1 μm) providing collinear propagation of both pulse replicas and thus a constant phase difference across the beam profile. The compact instrument allows for XUV pulse autocorrelation measurements in the time domain with a single-digit attosecond precision and a useful scan length of about 1 ps enabling a decent resolution of E/ΔE = 2000 at 26.6 eV. Its performance for selected spectroscopic applications requiring moderate resolution at short wavelengths is demonstrated by characterizing a sharp electronic transition at 26.6 eV in Ar gas. The absorption of the 11th harmonic of a frequency-doubled Yb-fiber laser leads to the well-known 3s3p64p1P1 Fano resonance of Ar atoms. We benchmark our time-domain interferometry results with a high-resolution XUV grating spectrometer and find an excellent agreement. The common-path interferometer opens up new opportunities for short-wavelength femtosecond and attosecond pulse metrology and dynamic studies on extreme time scales in various research fields.

Charge-induced chemical dynamics in glycine probed with time-resolved Auger electron spectroscopy

“…Thereby, the compact instrument minimizes temporal jitter and allows for time-resolved soft x-ray pump-probe electron and ion spectroscopy with a single-digit attosecond precision and a maximum useful scan length of about time delay. 32 …”

Generation of interferometrically stable pulse pairs from a free-electron laser using a birefringent interferometer

“…increasingly demanding at short wavelengths. This explains why, to date, only a few interferometric time-domain experiments have been reported in the XUV to X-ray regime [2,[6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13] or suggested theoretically [14,15].…”

Improved stabilization scheme for extreme ultraviolet quantum interference experiments

“…In order to observe interference between two optical pulses, sub-cycle phase/delay stability between the pulse replicas is required. This explains why techniques exploiting the interference between multiple laser pulses/beams are very challenging to perform at short wavelengths in the extreme ultraviolet (XUV) to x-ray regime where only a few such experiments have been reported to date [7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19].…”