Mobile source of high-energy single-cycle terahertz pulses

The Teramobile laser facility was used to realize the first mobile source of high-power THz pulses. The source is based on a tilted-pulse-front pumping THz generation scheme optimized for application of terawatt laser pulses. Generation of 50-μJ single-cycle electromagnetic pulses centered at 0.19 THz with a repetition rate of 10 Hz was obtained for incoming 700-fs 120-mJ near-infrared laser pulses. The corresponding laser-to-THz photon conversion efficiency is approximately 100%.     

Nonlinear cross-phase modulation with intense single-cycle terahertz pulses

We have demonstrated nonlinear cross-phase modulation in electro-optic crystals using intense, single-cycle terahertz (THz) radiation. Individual THz pulses, generated by coherent transition radiation emitted by subpicosecond electron bunches, have peak energies of up to 100 microJ per pulse. The time-dependent electric field of the intense THz pulses induces cross-phase modulation in electro-optic crystals through the Pockels effect, leading to spectral shifting, broadening, and modulation of copropagating laser pulses. The observed THz-induced cross-phase modulation agrees well with a time-dependent phase-shift model.     

Interaction of strong single-cycle terahertz pulses with semiconductor quantum wells

An experiment-theory comparison is presented to demonstrate terahertz-induced extreme-nonlinear transients in a GaAs/AlGaAs quantum-well system. The terahertz-pump and optical-probe experiments show pronounced spectral modulations of the light- and heavy-hole excitonic resonances. Excellent agreement with the results of microscopic many-body calculations is obtained, identifying clear ponderomotive contributions and the generation of terahertz harmonics.     

Generation of 30 microJ single-cycle terahertz pulses at 100 Hz repetition rate by optical rectification

We report the generation of 30 microJ single-cycle terahertz pulses at 100 Hz repetition rate by phase-matched optical rectification in lithium niobate using 28 mJ femtosecond laser pulses. The phase-matching condition is achieved by tilting the laser pulse intensity front. Temporal, spectral, and propagation properties of the generated terahertz pulses are presented. In addition, we discuss possibilities for further increasing the energy of single-cycle terahertz pulses obtained by optical rectification.     

Scattering and propagation of terahertz pulses in random soot aggregate systems

Scattering and propagation of terahertz pulses in random soot aggregate systems are studied by using the generalized multi-particle Mie-solution(GMM) and the pulse propagation theory. Soot aggregates are obtained by the diffusion-limited aggregation(DLA) model. For a soot aggregate in soot aggregate systems, scattering characteristics are analyzed by using the GMM. Scattering intensities versus scattering angles are given. The effects of different positions of the aggregate on the scattering intensities, scattering cross sections, extinction cross sections, and absorption cross sections are computed and compared. Based on pulse propagation in random media, the transmission of terahertz pulses in random soot aggregate systems is determined by the two-frequency mutual coherence function. Numerical simulations and analysis are given for terahertz pulses(0.7956 THz).     

On diagnostics of media using extremely short terahertz radiation pulses

The possibility of diagnosing the linear and nonlinear electrodynamic susceptibilities of media by examining the time profiles of extremely short terahertz radiation pulses (using pulsed terahertz spectroscopy methods) that are incident on a thin layer of a medium under study, are reflected from the layer, and are transmitted through it is shown theoretically. In the general case, the linear and nonlinear susceptibilities of different orders can be found by solving linear integral equations. Diagnostics is considerably simplified in the case of an isolated resonance of a medium with homogeneous spectral broadening, which is modeled by the response of an anharmonic oscillator.     

Laser-induced photoacoustics influenced by single-cycle terahertz radiation

Laser-induced plasma acoustic waves are enhanced under the illumination of single-cycle terahertz (THz) radiation, making THz-enhanced acoustics (TEA) a useful method for THz wave detection. During a single-cycle THz pulse with its peak field of 100 kV/cm, a pressure enhancement of 10% is observed throughout the acoustic spectrum up to 140 kHz, and the TEA signal is found to increase linearly with THz wave intensity. By using dual-color laser excitation to manipulate free electron drift, it is possible to modulate the enhanced acoustic signal and recover a coherent THz time-domain waveform by simply "listening" to the plasma.     

Propagation of ultrawideband short pulses of terahertz radiation through submillimeter-diameter circular waveguides

We report experimental investigations in which quasi-optical methods were used to efficiently couple freely propagating, optoelectronically generated, subpicosecond pulses of terahertz (THz) radiation into submillimeter circular metal tubes (waveguides) and, consequently, to measure the transmitted pulses from these waveguides. We observe very dispersive low-loss propagation over the frequency band from 0.65 to 3.5 THz, with frequency-dependent group velocities nu(g) ranging from c/4 to c and phase velocities nu(p) from 4c to c , where nu(g)nu(p)=c(2) . The linearly polarized incoming THz pulses couple significantly only into the TE(11) , TM(11) , and TE(12) modes of the utilized 24- and 4-mm-long stainless-steel tubes, with inside diameters of 240 and 280microm , respectively.     

Coherent plasmonic enhanced terahertz transmission through random metallic media

We experimentally show coherent, enhanced terahertz transmission through dense 3D random metallic media having subwavelength heterogeneity. Preservation of the incident polarization state and strong dispersion of the transmitted radiation indicate that the enhanced transmission is due to delocalized plasmonic propagation over distances 5 orders of magnitude greater than the skin depth. The experimental observations are supported by numerical finite difference time-domain simulations.     

Propagation of unipolar strain pulses in media with hysteretic nonlinearity

A theoretical study of the propagation of unipolar strain pulses in a solid medium with an arbitrary power-law hysteretic nonlinearity is carried out. Exact analytical expressions are derived for describing the propagation and evolution of initially sine-shaped and triangular pulses in such media. The solutions found are analyzed both numerically and graphically.     

Superluminal terahertz pulses

In femtosecond terahertz-pulse (T-ray) imaging of metal structures with dimensions of the order of the wavelength, it is observed that the T rays propagate faster than the vacuum speed of light. In the case of apertures this can be understood as a waveguide effect in which superluminal velocities are expected close to the cutoff frequency. However, the effect is also observed close to knife edges and in propagation past thin metal wires.     

超短THz脉冲在随机散射介质中的传播

用Monte-Carlo方法模拟了超短THz脉冲在随机散射介质中的传播.根据Mie理论计算出随机散射介质的散射系数和各向异性因子，研究了随机散射颗粒及介质厚度的大小对透射脉冲的影响.结果表明在Mie散射范围内，在相同的浓度下，颗粒尺寸越小，散射介质越厚，THz散射越严重，对透射脉冲的影响越大.散射同时降低了THz脉冲在随机散射介质中的成像分辨率. 关键词： 超短THz脉冲 随机散射介质 Mie理论 Monte-Carlo方法     

Multiphoton ionization of molecular hydrogen by single-cycle pulses

Multiphoton ionization, first observed by N.B. Delone in 1965, has been a subject of intense studies ever since. In this paper we consider multiphoton ionization of molecules in the limit of subopticalcycle pulse duration. Moreover, we study the regime where the molecules are first prepared in a coherent vibrational superposition state, and then are subjected to sub-cycle laser pulses synchronized with respect to the phase of the coherent molecular motion. The present approach is based on the Keldysh formalism, which assumes that the final free electron’s state is much more sensitive to the pulse than the bound initial wavefunction [1]. We find that the ionization rate depends not only on the sub-cycle shape of the laser pulses, but also on the time delay between the arrival of pulses and molecular motion.     

Solitons evolving toward few-and single-cycle pulses in photonic-crystal fibers

Numerical analysis of soliton dynamics in highly nonlinear photonic-crystal fibers reveals intriguing scenarios enabling efficient pulse compression down to single-cycle field waveforms. We derive simple analytical expressions relating the pulse width and the energy of ultrashort pulses generated through such a field-evolution dynamics to the fiber dispersion and nonlinearity.     

Time reversal and object reconstruction with single-cycle pulses

We demonstrate the reconstruction of one- and two-dimensional objects by numerically backpropagating measured scattered terahertz transients. The spatial resolution determined by the Sparrow criterion is found to correspond to approximately 30% of the peak wavelength and 85% of the mean wavelength of the power spectrum of the single-cycle waveform.     

Whispering-gallery mode terahertz pulses

We report what is to our knowledge the first observation of a subpicosecond terahertz (THz) pulse propagating as a superposition of the whispering-gallery modes (WGMs) of a dielectric cylinder. The WGM THz pulses are coupled into and out of a 5-mm-diameter silicon cylinder via a 100-mum -thick, single-mode silicon slab waveguide. We observed two round-trip cylindrical cavity pulses from this coupling structure, which cover a continuous frequency range from 0.4 to 1.8 THz. The coupled-mode equations are used to analyze this system and give reasonably good agreement with the experiment in both the frequency and the time domains.