Single thin-plate compression of multi-TW laser pulses to 3.9 fs
Szabolcs Tóth, Roland S. Nagymihály, Imre Seres, Levente Lehotai, János Csontos, László Tóth, P. Geetha, Tamás Somoskői, Barna Kajla, Dániel Abt, Viktor Pajer, A.P. Farkas, Árpád Mohácsi, Ádám Börzsönyi, K. Osvay
Abstract
Post-compression of 12-fs laser pulses with multi-TW peak power from an optical parametric chirped pulse amplification (OPCPA) system was performed by using a single thin fused silica plate in a vacuum. By optimizing the input pulses in both spatial and temporal domains, after compression with customized chirped mirrors, we achieved pulses as short as 3.87 fs, in combination with 12-mJ energy. The spatio-spectral quality of the post-compressed pulses was thoroughly analyzed. The generated 1.4-cycle pulses pave the way for next generation attosecond and particle acceleration experiments.