Carrier-envelope phase on-chip scanner and control of laser beams.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 37604799.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-023-40802-z and PMC identifier 10442376.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
The carrier-envelope phase (CEP) is an important property of few-cycle laser pulses, allowing for light field control of electronic processes during laser-matter interactions. Thus, the measurement and control of CEP is essential for applications of few-cycle lasers. Currently, there is no robust method for measuring the non-trivial spatial CEP distribution of few-cycle laser pulses. Here, we demonstrate a compact on-chip, ambient-air, CEP scanning probe with 0.1 µm<sup>3</sup> resolution based on optical driving of CEP-sensitive ultrafast currents in a metal-dielectric heterostructure. We successfully apply the probe to obtain a 3D map of spatial changes of CEP in the vicinity of an oscillator beam focus with pulses as weak as 1 nJ. We also demonstrate CEP control in the focal volume with a spatial light modulator so that arbitrary spatial CEP sculpting could be realized.