Solitary beam propagation in periodic layered Kerr media enables high-efficiency pulse compression and mode self-cleaning

Sheng Zhang; Zongyuan Fu; Bingbing Zhu; Guangyu Fan; Yudong Chen; Shunjia Wang; Yaxin Liu; Andrius Baltuska; Cheng Jin; Chuanshan Tian; Zhensheng Tao

doi:10.1038/s41377-021-00495-9

Go to Nature Website

Your Location：

Home >

Browse articles >

Solitary beam propagation in periodic layered Kerr media enables high-efficiency pulse compression and mode self-cleaning

Letter

- Solitary beam propagation in periodic layered Kerr media enables high-efficiency pulse compression and mode self-cleaning
- Light: Science & Applications Vol. 10, Issue 4, Pages: 464-474(2021)
- Affiliations：
  
  1.State Key Laboratory of Surface Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai, China
  2.Institute of Photonics, TU Wien, Gusshausstrasse 27/387, Vienna, Austria
  3.Department of Applied Physics, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210094, China
- Author bio：
  
  Zhensheng Tao (zhenshengtao@fudan.edu.cn)
- Funds：
- DOI：10.1038/s41377-021-00495-9
  CLC：
- Published：30 April 2021，
  
  Published Online：10 March 2021，
  
  Received：12 November 2020，
  
  Revised：07 February 2021，
  
  Accepted：15 February 2021
- Accepted：
Scan QR Code
Zhang, S. et al. Solitary beam propagation in periodic layered Kerr media enables high-efficiency pulse compression and mode self-cleaning. Light: Science & Applications, 10, 464-474 (2021).
DOI：

Zhang, S. et al. Solitary beam propagation in periodic layered Kerr media enables high-efficiency pulse compression and mode self-cleaning. Light: Science & Applications, 10, 464-474 (2021). DOI： 10.1038/s41377-021-00495-9.

摘要

Abstract

Generating intense ultrashort pulses with high-quality spatial modes is crucial for ultrafast and strong-field science and can be achieved by nonlinear supercontinuum generation (SCG) and pulse compression. In this work

we propose that the generation of quasi-stationary solitons in periodic layered Kerr media can greatly enhance the nonlinear light-matter interaction and fundamentally improve the performance of SCG and pulse compression in condensed media. With both experimental and theoretical studies

we successfully identify these solitary modes and reveal their unified condition for stability. Space-time coupling is shown to strongly influence the stability of solitons

leading to variations in the spectral

spatial and temporal profiles of femtosecond pulses. Taking advantage of the unique characteristics of these solitary modes

we first demonstrate single-stage SCG and the compression of femtosecond pulses from 170 to 22 fs with an efficiency > 85%. The high spatiotemporal quality of the compressed pulses is further confirmed by high-harmonic generation. We also provide evidence of efficient mode self-cleaning

which suggests rich spatiotemporal self-organization of the laser beams in a nonlinear resonator. This work offers a route towards highly efficient

simple

stable and highly flexible SCG and pulse compression solutions for state-of-the-art ytterbium laser technology.

关键词

Keywords

references

Rothhardt, J. et al. Octave-spanning OPCPA system delivering CEP-stable few-cycle pulses and 22 W of average power at 1 MHz repetition rate.Opt. Express20, 10870–10878 (2012)..

Dubietis, A., Butkus, R.&Piskarskas, A. P. Trends in chirped pulse optical parametric amplification.IEEE J. Sel. Top. Quantum Electron.12, 163–172 (2006)..

Elu, U. et al. High average power and single-cycle pulses from a mid-IR optical parametric chirped pulse amplifier.Optica4, 1024–1029 (2017)..

Fattahi, H. et al. Third-generation femtosecond technology.Optica1, 45–63 (2014)..

Budriūnas, R. et al. 53 W average power CEP-stabilized OPCPA system delivering 5.5 TW few cycle pulses at 1 kHz repetition rate.Opt. Express25, 5797–5806 (2017)..

Nisoli, M., De Silvestri, S.&Svelto, O. Generation of high energy 10 fs pulses by a new pulse compression technique.Appl. Phys. Lett.68, 2793–2795 (1996)..

Cardin, V. et al. 0.42 TW 2-cycle pulses at 1.8 μm via hollow-core fiber compression.Appl. Phys. Lett.107, 181101 (2015)..

Ouillé, M. et al. Relativistic-intensity near-single-cycle light waveforms at kHz repetition rate.Light. : Sci. Appl.9, 47 (2020)..

Nagy, T. et al. Generation of three-cycle multi-millijoule laser pulses at 318 W average power.Optica6, 1423–1424 (2019)..

Jeong, Y. G. et al. Direct compression of 170-fs 50-cycle pulses down to 1.5 cycles with 70% transmission.Sci. Rep.8, 11794 (2018)..

Lavenu, L. et al. High-power two-cycle ultrafast source based on hybrid nonlinear compression.Opt. Express27, 1958–1967 (2019)..

Balciunas, T. et al. A strong-field driver in the single-cycle regime based on self-compression in a kagome fibre.Nat. Commun.6, 6117 (2015)..

Köttig, F. et al. Efficient single-cycle pulse compression of an ytterbium fiber laser at 10 MHz repetition rate.Opt. Express28, 9099–9110 (2020)..

Lavenu, L. et al. Nonlinear pulse compression based on a gas-filled multipass cell.Opt. Lett.43, 2252–2255 (2018)..

Balla, P. et al. Postcompression of picosecond pulses into the few-cycle regime.Opt. Lett.45, 2572–2575 (2020)..

Kaumanns, M. et al. Multipass spectral broadening of 18 mJ pulses compressible from 1.3 ps to 41 fs.Opt. Lett.43, 5877–5880 (2018)..

Weitenberg, J. et al. Multi-pass-cell-based nonlinear pulse compression to 115 fs at 7.5 µJ pulse energy and 300 W average power.Opt. Express25, 20502–20510 (2017)..

Ueffing, M. et al. Nonlinear pulse compression in a gas-filled multipass cell.Opt. Lett.43, 2070–2073 (2018)..

Boyd, R. W.Nonlinear Optics. 3rd edn. (Academic Press, 2008).

Beetar, J. E., Gholam-Mirzaei, S.&Chini, M. Spectral broadening and pulse compression of a 400μJ, 20 W Yb: KGW laser using a multi-plate medium.Appl. Phys. Lett.112, 051102 (2018)..

Cheng, Y. C. et al. Supercontinuum generation in a multi-plate medium.Opt. Express24, 7224–7231 (2016)..

Ishii, N. et al. Optical parametric amplification of carrier-envelope phase-stabilized mid-infrared pulses generated by intra-pulse difference frequency generation.Opt. Express27, 11447–11454 (2019)..

Lu, C. H. et al. Generation of intense supercontinuum in condensed media.Optica1, 400–406 (2014)..

Lu, C. H. et al. Greater than 50 times compression of 1030 nm Yb: KGW laser pulses to single-cycle duration.Opt. Express27, 15638–15648 (2019)..

He, P. et al. High-efficiency supercontinuum generation in solid thin plates at 0.1 TW level.Opt. Lett.42, 474–477 (2017)..

Bergé, L. et al. Self-guiding light in layered nonlinear media.Opt. Lett.25, 1037–1039 (2000)..

Vlasov, S. N., Petrishchev, V. A.&Talanov, V. I. Theory of periodic selffocusing of light beams.Radiophys. Quantum Electron.13, 716–719 (1970)..

Towers, I.&Malomed, B. A. Stable (2+1)-dimensional solitons in a layered medium with sign-alternating Kerr nonlinearity.J. Optical Soc. Am. B19, 537–543 (2002)..

Centurion, M. et al. Nonlinearity management in optics: experiment, theory, and simulation.Phys. Rev. Lett.97, 033903 (2006)..

Lederer, F. et al. Discrete solitons in optics.Phys. Rep.463, 1–126 (2008)..

Giesen, A. et al. Scalable concept for diode-pumped high-power solid-state lasers.Appl. Phys. B58, 365–372 (1994)..

der Au, J. A. et al. 16.2-W average power from a diode-pumped femtosecond Yb: YAG thin disk laser.Opt. Lett.25, 859–861 (2000)..

Röser, F. et al. 131 W 220 fs fiber laser system.Opt. Lett.30, 2754–2756 (2005)..

Fox, A. G.&Li, T. Y. Effect of gain saturation on the oscillating modes of optical masers.IEEE J. Quantum Electron.2, 774–783 (1966)..

Trebino, R. et al. Measuring ultrashort laser pulses in the time-frequency domain using frequency-resolved optical gating.Rev. Sci. Instrum.68, 3277–3295 (1997)..

Planas, S. A. et al. Spectral narrowing in the propagation of chirped pulses in single-mode fibers.Opt. Lett.18, 699–701 (1993)..

Weiner, A. M., Heritage, J. P.&Stolen, R. H. Self-phase modulation and optical pulse compression influenced by stimulated Raman scattering in fibers.J. Optical Soc. Am. B5, 364–372 (1988)..

Ferray, M. et al. Multiple-harmonic conversion of 1064 nm radiation in rare gases.J. Phys. B At. Mol. Opt. Phys.21, L31–L35 (1988)..

McPherson, A. et al. Studies of multiphoton production of vacuum-ultraviolet radiation in the rare gases.J. Optical Soc. Am. B4, 595–601 (1987)..

Rundquist, A. et al. Phase-matched generation of coherent soft x-rays.Science280, 1412–1415 (1998)..

Brabec, T.&Krausz, F. Intense few-cycle laser fields: frontiers of nonlinear optics.Rev. Mod. Phys.72, 545–591 (2000)..

Jin, C. et al. Generation of isolated attosecond pulses in the far field by spatial filtering with an intense few-cycle mid-infrared laser.Phys. Rev. A84, 043411 (2011)..

Christov, I. P. et al. Nonadiabatic effects in high-harmonic generation with ultrashort pulses.Phys. Rev. Lett.77, 1743–1746 (1996)..

Krause, J. L. et al. High-order harmonic generation from atoms and ions in the high intensity regime.Phys. Rev. Lett.68, 3535–3538 (1992)..

Corkum, P. B. Plasma perspective on strong field multiphoton ionization.Phys. Rev. Lett.71, 1994–1997 (1993)..

Lewenstein, M. et al. Theory of high-harmonic generation by low-frequency laser fields.Phys. Rev. A49, 2117–2132 (1994)..

Seidel, M. et al. All solid-state spectral broadening: an average and peak power scalable method for compression of ultrashort pulses.Opt. Express24, 9412–9428 (2016)..

Demmler, S. et al. Generation of high photon flux coherent soft x-ray radiation with few-cycle pulses.Opt. Lett.38, 5051–5054 (2013)..

Infeld, E.&Rowlands, G.Nonlinear Waves, Solitons, and Chaos. (Cambridge University Press, 1990).

Prade, B. et al. Spatial mode cleaning by femtosecond filamentation in air.Opt. Lett.31, 2601–2603 (2006)..

Moll, K. D., Gaeta, A. L.&Fibich, G. Self-similar optical wave collapse: observation of the townes profile.Phys. Rev. Lett.90, 203902 (2003)..

Krupa, K. et al. Spatial beam self-cleaning in multimode fibres.Nat. Photonics11, 237–241 (2017)..

Wright, L. G., Christodoulides, D. N.&Wise, F. W. Controllable spatiotemporal nonlinear effects in multimode fibres.Nat. Photonics9, 306–310 (2015)..

Böhle, F. et al. Compression of CEP-stable multi-mJ laser pulses down to 4 fs in long hollow fibers.Laser Phys. Lett.11, 095401 (2014)..

Nisoli, M. et al. Compression of high-energy laser pulses below 5 fs.Opt. Lett.22, 522–524 (1997)..

Fritsch, K. et al. All-solid-state multipass spectral broadening to sub-20 fs.Opt. Lett.43, 4643–4646 (2018)..

Vicentini, E. et al. Nonlinear pulse compression to 22 fs at 15.6 µJ by an all-solid-state multipass approach.Opt. Express28, 4541–4549 (2020)..

Christov, I. P. et al. Mode locking with a compensated space–time astigmatism.Opt. Lett.20, 2111–2113 (1995)..

Eisenberg, H. S. et al. Discrete spatial optical solitons in waveguide arrays.Phys. Rev. Lett.81, 3383–3386 (1998)..

Christodoulides, D. N.&Joseph, R. I. Discrete self-focusing in nonlinear arrays of coupled waveguides.Opt. Lett.13, 794–796 (1988)..

Fleischer, J. W. et al. Observation of discrete solitons in optically induced real time waveguide arrays.Phys. Rev. Lett.90, 023902 (2003)..

Neshev, D. et al. Spatial solitons in optically induced gratings.Opt. Lett.28, 710–712 (2003)..

Skryabin, D. V. et al. Soliton self-frequency shift cancellation in photonic crystal fibers.Science301, 1705–1708 (2003)..

Sivan, Y., Fibich, G.&Weinstein, M. I. Waves in nonlinear lattices: ultrashort optical pulses and Bose-Einstein condensates.Phys. Rev. Lett.97, 193902 (2006)..

Saito, H.&Ueda, M. Dynamically stabilized bright solitons in a two-dimensional bose-einstein condensate.Phys. Rev. Lett.90, 040403 (2003)..

Davydov, A. S. Solitons and energy transfer along protein molecules.J. Theor. Biol.66, 379–387 (1977)..

Bergé, L. et al. Ultrashort filaments of light in weakly ionized, optically transparent media.Rep. Prog. Phys.70, 1633–1713 (2007)..

Wigner, E. On the quantum correction for thermodynamic equilibrium.Phys. Rev.40, 749–759 (1932)..

Salières, P., L'Huillier, A.&Lewenstein, M. Coherence control of high-order harmonics.Phys. Rev. Lett.74, 3776–3779 (1995)..

Jin, C., Le, A. T.&Lin, C. D. Medium propagation effects in high-order harmonic generation of Ar and N2.Phys. Rev. A83, 023411 (2011)..

Lin, C. D. et al. Elements of the quantitative rescattering theory.J. Phys. B: At., Mol. Optical Phys.51, 104001 (2018)..

Le, A. T. et al. Quantitative rescattering theory for high-order harmonic generation from molecules.Phys. Rev. A80, 013401 (2009)..

Views

Downloads

CSCD

Alert me when the article has been cited

Submit

Tools

Publicity Resources

No data

Related Author

No data

Related Institution

No data

⁰