Tunable high-order harmonic generation in GeSbTe nano-films.

High-order harmonic generation (HHG) in solids opens new frontiers in ultrafast spectroscopy of carrier and field dynamics in condensed matter, picometer resolution structural lattice characterization and designing compact platforms for attosecond pulse sources. Nanoscale structuring of solid surfaces provides a powerful tool for controlling the spatial characteristics and efficiency of the harmonic emission. Here we study HHG in a prototypical phase-change material GeSbTe (GST).

A solid-state high harmonic generation spectrometer with cryogenic cooling.

Solid-state high harmonic generation (sHHG) spectroscopy is a promising technique for studying electronic structure, symmetry, and dynamics in condensed matter systems. Here, we report on the implementation of an advanced sHHG spectrometer based on a vacuum chamber and closed-cycle helium cryostat. Using an in situ temperature probe, it is demonstrated that the sample interaction region retains cryogenic temperature during the application of high-intensity femtosecond laser pulses that generate high harmonics.

Signatures of Multiband Effects in High-Harmonic Generation in Monolayer MoS_{2}.

High-harmonic generation (HHG) in solids has been touted as a way to probe ultrafast dynamics and crystal symmetries in condensed matter systems. Here, we investigate the polarization properties of high-order harmonics generated in monolayer MoS_{2}, as a function of crystal orientation relative to the mid-infrared laser field polarization. At several different laser wavelengths we experimentally observe a prominent angular shift of the parallel-polarized odd harmonics for energies above approximately 3.

Table-top extreme ultraviolet second harmonic generation.

The lack of available table-top extreme ultraviolet (XUV) sources with high enough fluxes and coherence properties has limited the availability of nonlinear XUV and x-ray spectroscopies to free-electron lasers (FELs). Here, we demonstrate second harmonic generation (SHG) on a table-top XUV source by observing SHG near the Ti M edge with a high-harmonic seeded soft x-ray laser. Furthermore, this experiment represents the first SHG experiment in the XUV.

Polarization Dependent Excitation and High Harmonic Generation from Intense Mid-IR Laser Pulses in ZnO.

The generation of high order harmonics from femtosecond mid-IR laser pulses in ZnO has shown great potential to reveal new insight into the ultrafast electron dynamics on a few femtosecond timescale. In this work we report on the experimental investigation of photoluminescence and high-order harmonic generation (HHG) in a ZnO single crystal and polycrystalline thin film irradiated with intense femtosecond mid-IR laser pulses. The ellipticity dependence of the HHG process is experimentally studied up to the 17th harmonic order for various driving laser wavelengths in the spectral range 3-4 µm.

Discrete dispersion scan setup for measuring few-cycle laser pulses in the mid-infrared.

In this work, we demonstrate a discrete dispersion scan scheme using a low number of flat windows to vary the dispersion of laser pulses in discrete steps. Monte Carlo simulations indicate that the pulse duration can be retrieved accurately with less than 10 dispersion steps, which we verify experimentally by measuring few-cycle pulses and material dispersion curves at 3 and 10 µm wavelength. This minimal measuring scheme using only five optical components without the need for linear positioners and interferometric alignment can be readily implemented in many wavelength ranges and situations.

Carrier-envelope-phase measurement of few-cycle mid-infrared laser pulses using high harmonic generation in ZnO.

High-harmonic generation (HHG) in crystals offers a simple, affordable and easily accessible route to carrier-envelope phase (CEP) measurements, which scales favorably towards longer wavelengths. We present measurements of HHG in ZnO using few-cycle pulses at 3.1µm.

Toward high contrast and high-resolution microscopic ghost imaging.

In this study, the influence of speckle size on contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) and resolution is examined based on the object dimensions in the macroscopic and microscopic regimes. This research shows that for microscopic samples the conventional scaling laws are no longer effective and the CNR does not counter-propagate in the same manner as the resolution. To our knowledge, a deviation in CNR scaling on speckle size is observed for the first time in the field of microscopic ghost imaging.

Strong Light-Field Driven Nanolasers.

Einstein established the quantum theory of radiation and paved the way for modern laser physics including single-photon absorption by charge carriers and finally pumping an active gain medium into population inversion. This can be easily understood in the particle picture of light. Using intense, ultrashort pulse lasers, multiphoton pumping of an active medium has been realized.

Two-Photon-Induced CO-Releasing Molecules as Molecular Logic Systems in Solution, Polymers, and Cells.

Phototherapeutic applications of carbon monoxide (CO)-releasing molecules are limited because they require harmful UV and blue light for activation. We describe two-photon excitation with NIR light (800 nm)-induced CO-release from two Mn tricarbonyl complexes bearing 1,8-naphthalimide units (1, 2). Complex 2 behaves as a logic OR gate in solution, nonwovens, and in HeLa cells.

Wavelength-scale ptychographic coherent diffractive imaging using a high-order harmonic source.

Ptychography enables coherent diffractive imaging (CDI) of extended samples by raster scanning across the illuminating XUV/X-ray beam, thereby generalizing the unique advantages of CDI techniques. Table-top realizations of this method are urgently needed for many applications in sciences and industry. Previously, it was only possible to image features much larger than the illuminating wavelength with table-top ptychography although knife-edge tests suggested sub-wavelength resolution.

Polarization evolution in single-ring antiresonant hollow-core fibers.

Understanding polarization in waveguides is of fundamental importance for any photonic device and is particularly relevant within the scope of fiber optics. Here, we investigate the dependence of the geometry-induced polarization behavior of single-ring antiresonant hollow-core fibers on various parameters from the experimental perspective, showing that structural deviations from an ideal polygonal shape impose birefringence and polarization-dependent loss, confirmed by a toy model. The minimal output ellipticity was found at the wavelength of lowest loss near the center of the transmission band, whereas birefringence substantially increases toward the resonances.

Resonance-enhanced multi-octave supercontinuum generation in antiresonant hollow-core fibers.

Ultrafast supercontinuum generation in gas-filled waveguides is an enabling technology for many intriguing applications ranging from attosecond metrology towards biophotonics, with the amount of spectral broadening crucially depending on the pulse dispersion of the propagating mode. In this study, we show that structural resonances in a gas-filled antiresonant hollow core optical fiber provide an additional degree of freedom in dispersion engineering, which enables the generation of more than three octaves of broadband light that ranges from deep UV wavelengths to near infrared. Our observation relies on the introduction of a geometric-induced resonance in the spectral vicinity of the ultrafast pump laser, outperforming gas dispersion and yielding a unique dispersion profile independent of core size, which is highly relevant for scaling input powers.

Avalanche of stimulated forward scattering in high harmonic generation.

Optical amplifiers in all ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum exhibit an essential characteristic, namely the input signal during the propagation in the amplifier medium is multiplied by the avalanche effect of the stimulated emission to produce exponential growth. We perform a theoretical study motivated and supported by experimental data on a He gas amplifier driven by intense 30-fs-long laser pulses and seeded with attosecond pulse trains generated in a separated Ne gas jet. We demonstrate that the strong-field theory in the frame of high harmonic generation fully supports the appearance of the avalanche effect in the amplification of extreme ultraviolet attosecond pulse trains.

Extreme ultraviolet digital in-line holography using a tabletop source.

Digital in-line holography (DIH) offers fast, lensless, and aberration-free imaging with diffraction-limited resolution and inherently combines phase- and amplitude-contrast imaging, as well as three-dimensional imaging. Extending this technique to shorter wavelengths allows increasing the achievable spatial and phase-contrast resolution, as well as accessing material parameters not accessible in the optical domain. In this paper, we report on DIH experiments conducted with a coherent tabletop ultrafast high harmonic source operated at 38 nm wavelength.

Cancer cell classification with coherent diffraction imaging using an extreme ultraviolet radiation source.

In cancer treatment, it is highly desirable to classify single cancer cells in real time. The standard method is polymerase chain reaction requiring a substantial amount of resources and time. Here, we present an innovative approach for rapidly classifying different cell types: we measure the diffraction pattern of a single cell illuminated with coherent extreme ultraviolet (XUV) laser-generated radiation.

Generation of multi-millijoule red-shifted pulses for seeding stimulated Raman backscattering amplifiers.

The efficient generation of redshifted pulses from chirped femtosecond joule level Bessel beam pulses in gases is studied. The redshift spans from a few 100 cm⁻¹ to several 1000 cm⁻¹ corresponding to a shift of 50-500 nm for Nd:glass laser systems. The generated pulses have an almost perfect Gaussian beam profile insensitive of the pump beam profile, and are much shorter than the pump pulses.

Spectral broadening and compression of sub-millijoule laser pulses in hollow-core fibers filled with sulfur hexafluoride.

Spectral broadening in gas-filled hollow-core fibers is discussed for sulfur hexafluoride, a molecular gas with Raman activity. Experimental results for compressed pulses are presented for input pulses longer than the Raman period and shorter than the dephasing time at a central wavelength of 800 nm and 400 nm, respectively. For both wavelengths we compress the pulses by a factor of three and maintain a good pulse quality.

XUV coherent diffraction imaging in reflection geometry with low numerical aperture.

We present an experimental realization of coherent diffraction imaging in reflection geometry illuminating the sample with a laser driven high harmonic generation (HHG) based XUV source. After recording the diffraction pattern in reflection geometry, the data must be corrected before the image can be reconstructed with a hybrid-input-output (HIO) algorithm. In this paper we present a detailed investigation of sources of spoiling the reconstructed image due to the nonlinear momentum transfer, errors in estimating the angle of incidence on the sample, and distortions by placing the image off center in the computation grid.

Optical control of hard X-ray polarization by electron injection in a laser wakefield accelerator.

Laser-plasma particle accelerators could provide more compact sources of high-energy radiation than conventional accelerators. Moreover, because they deliver radiation in femtosecond pulses, they could improve the time resolution of X-ray absorption techniques. Here we show that we can measure and control the polarization of ultra-short, broad-band keV photon pulses emitted from a laser-plasma-based betatron source.

Extreme ultraviolet light source based on intracavity high harmonic generation in a mode locked Ti:sapphire oscillator with 9.4 MHz repetition rate.

We report on the realization of an intracavity high harmonic source with a cutoff above 30 eV. The EUV source is based on a high power, hard-aperture, Kerr-lens mode-locked Ti:sapphire oscillator with a repetition rate of 9.4 MHz.

Improving high-order harmonic yield using wavefront-controlled ultrashort laser pulses.

In this work we show that it is possible to increase the high-order harmonic yield when using wavefront-shaped laser beams. The investigation of the beam profile near the interaction region shows that the optimized beam is asymmetric and has a larger diameter. Thus, the optimized beam leads to a higher yield even if the peak intensity is lower compared to an unoptimized beam.

Deducing the electron-beam diameter in a laser-plasma accelerator using x-ray betatron radiation.

We investigate the properties of a laser-plasma electron accelerator as a bright source of keV x-ray radiation. During the interaction, the electrons undergo betatron oscillations and from the carefully measured x-ray spectrum the oscillation amplitude of the electrons can be deduced which decreases with increasing electron energies. From the oscillation amplitude and the independently measured x-ray source size of (1.