Abstract

We investigated theoretically and experimentally the ultrafast birefringence induced by impulsive alignment in a molecular gas during optical filamentation. This phenomenon is able to substantially affect the polarization state of an ultrashort laser pulse that propagates through the aligned medium at suitable delays from a first aligning pulse. We exploited this modulation of the polarization state in order to effectively control the high-order harmonic generation (HHG) process, which is strongly dependent on the driving pulse polarization. These results open new and fascinating perspectives for the tailoring of strong-field phenomena by means of polarization pulse shaping.

© 2010 Optical Society of America

Femtosecond filamentation and pulse compression in the wake of molecular alignment

Jian Wu, Hua Cai, Heping Zeng, and Arnaud Couairon
Opt. Lett. 33(22) 2593-2595 (2008)

All-optical ultrafast polarization switching of terahertz radiation by impulsive molecular alignment

Min Li, Haifeng Pan, Yuqi Tong, Cheng Chen, Yi Shi, Jian Wu, and Heping Zeng
Opt. Lett. 36(18) 3633-3635 (2011)

Wavelength scaling of elliptical-polarization dependence of high-order harmonic generation

Han Xu, Hui Xiong, Bin Zeng, Wei Chu, Yuxi Fu, Jingpin Yao, Jing Chen, Xiaojun Liu, Ya Cheng, and Zhizhan Xu
Opt. Lett. 35(4) 472-474 (2010)

Pulse polarization evolution and control in the wake of molecular alignment inside a filament

Shuai Yuan, Tie-Jun Wang, Haifeng Pan, Lijuan Zheng, See Leang Chin, and Heping Zeng
Opt. Express 23(5) 5582-5589 (2015)

Spectral modulation of femtosecond laser pulse induced by molecular alignment revivals

Hua Cai, Jian Wu, Arnaud Couairon, and Heping Zeng
Opt. Lett. 34(6) 827-829 (2009)