Measurement of pressure dependent nonlinear refractive index of inert gases.

The propagation of high intensity laser beams is excessively affected by optical nonlinear effects, thereby the knowledge of the nonlinear refractive indices of the beam guiding media is indispensable in the design of laser systems and experiments. Apart from undesired self-focusing, several areas of modern laser spectroscopy can utilize optical nonlinearity, from LiDAR measurements to filamentation. In this paper we report on a direct measurement of pressure dependent nonlinear refractive index of Ar, N2, Ne, Xe, and air between 0.05 mbar and 1 bar, based on the powerful technique called spectrally and spatially resolved interferometry. In this way the total value of nonlinear refractive index is measured, that is the sum of all elementary phenomena contributing to the intensity dependent refractivity of the gases.

Dispersion measurement of inert gases and gas mixtures at 800 nm.

Dispersion of femtosecond laser pulses propagating in Ar, He, Kr, N(2), Ne, Xe, and their mixtures is measured by spectrally and spatially resolved interferometry. By varying the gas pressure in a 4.5 m long tube between 0.05 mbar and ambient pressure, the first, second, and third order phase derivatives of broadband laser pulses are determined at 800 nm under standard conditions. The dispersion of gases and gas mixtures obeys the Lorentz-Lorenz formula with an accuracy of 0.7%. Based on the measured pressure dependent dispersion values in the near infrared and the refractive indices available from the literature for the ultraviolet and visible, a pressure dependent Sellmeier-type formula is fitted for each gas. These common form, two-term dispersion equations provide an accuracy between 4.1x10(-9) (Ne) and 4.3x10(-7) (Xe) for the refractive indices, from UV to near IR.

Double chirped-pulse-amplification laser: a way to clean pulses temporally.

We demonstrate a double chirped-pulse-amplification (CPA) Ti: sapphire laser system that includes two CPA stages with intermediate nonlinear temporal pulse filtering. The method makes it possible to reduce substantially the background of amplified spontaneous emission (ASE), including prepulses and postpulses. An ASE temporal contrast of 10(10) was demonstrated at 20 mJ of output energy and 50-fs pulse duration. The demonstrated scheme is applicable to petawatt power-level laser systems.