Generation and control of chirped, ultrafast pulse trains

Journal article

A method for generating non-uniformly spaced (chirped) trains of high-energy, high-contrast, femtosecond pulses is described and demonstrated. In this method a temporally stretched laser pulse is passed through an acousto-optic programmable dispersive filter (AOPDF), a birefringent plate, and a linear polarizer. It is demonstrated that linear and nonlinear variation of the pulse separation within the train may be controlled by changing respectively the third-and fourth-order dispersion introduced by the AOPDF. Programmable, non-uniform pulse trains of this type may find applications in quasi-phase matching high-harmonic generation. © 2010 IOP Publishing Ltd.

Authors: O'Keeffe, K; Robinson, T; Hooker, S

• Publication status: Published
• Journal: JOURNAL OF OPTICS
• Volume: 12
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 015201-015201
• Publication date: 2010-01-01
• DOI: 10.1088/2040-8978/12/1/015201
• EISSN: 1741-3567
• ISSN: 2040-8978
• Language: English
• Keywords: programmable dispersive filter; ultrafast pulse trains; quasi-phase-matching