title: Self-compression of millijoule 1.5 microm pulses.
abstract: We demonstrate a four-stage optical parametric chirped-pulse amplification system that delivers carrier-envelope phase-stable approximately 1.5 microm pulses with energies up to 12.5 mJ before recompression. The system is based on a fusion of femtosecond diode-pumped solid-state Yb technology and a picosecond 100 mJ Nd:YAG pump laser. Pulses with 62 nm bandwidth are recompressed to a 74.4 fs duration close to the transform limit. To show the way toward a terawatt-peak-power single-cycle IR source, we demonstrate self-compression of 2.2 mJ pulses down to 19.8 fs duration in a single filament in argon with a 1.5 mJ output energy and 66% energy throughput.
authors.affiliation: Photonics Institute, Vienna University of Technology, Gusshausstrasse 27-387, A-1040 Vienna, Austria. oliver.muecke@tuwien.ac.at
authors.forename: Oliver D
authors.initials: OD
authors.lastname: Mücke
authors.forename: Skirmantas
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Alisauskas
authors.forename: Aart J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Verhoef
authors.forename: Audrius
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Pugzlys
authors.forename: Andrius
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Baltuska
authors.forename: Valerijus
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Smilgevicius
authors.forename: Jonas
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Pocius
authors.forename: Linas
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Giniūnas
authors.forename: Romualdas
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Danielius
authors.forename: Nicolas
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Forget