We demonstrate the generation, spectral broadening and post-compression of second harmonic pulses using a thin beta barium borate (BBO) crystal on a fused-silica substrate as the nonlinear interaction medium. By combining second harmonic generation in the BBO crystal with self-phase modulation in the fused-silica substrate, we efficiently generate millijoule-level broadband violet pulses from a single optical component. The second harmonic spectrum covers a range from long wave ultraviolet (down to 310 nm) to visible (up to 550 nm) with a bandwidth of 65 nm. Subsequently, we compress the second harmonic beam to a duration of 4.8 fs with a pulse energy of 0.64 mJ (5 fs with a pulse energy of 1.05 mJ) using chirped mirrors. The all-solid free-space apparatus is compact, robust and pulse energy scalable, making it highly advantageous for generating intense second harmonic pulses from near-infrared femtosecond lasers in the sub-5 fs regime.

The post-compression technique based on self-phase modulation of high-energy pulses leads to an increase in achievable peak power and intensity. Typically, the pulses considered in experiments have been less than 100 fs in duration. Here, the method is applied to the ELFIE laser system at the LULI facility, for a pulse of 7 J energy and an initial measured duration of 350 fs. A 5-mm-thick fused silica window and a 2 mm cyclic-olefin polymer were used as optical nonlinear materials. The 9 cm diameter beam was spectrally broadened to a bandwidth corresponding to 124 fs Fourier-limited pulse duration, and then it was partly post-compressed to 200 fs. After measuring the spatial spectra of the beam fluence, a uniform gain factor of 4 increase in the fluctuations over the studied range of frequencies is observed, due to small-scale self-focusing.

An exceptionally high stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) conversion efficiency to the first Stokes component associated with the secondary (low-frequency and low intensity) vibrational mode ν2 (∼330cm-1) was observed in a BaWO4 crystal in a highly transient regime of interaction. The effect takes place in the range of pump pulse energy from ∼0.1 to ∼0.5µJ with maximum energy conversion efficiency up to 35% at 0.2 µJ. The nature of the observed effects is explained by interference of SRS and self-phase modulation, where the latter is related to a noninstantaneous orientational Kerr nonlinearity in the BaWO4 crystal.

对高能量掺镱激光器进行腔外压缩，是获得高能量少数周期脉冲的重要方式。通过数值模拟研究了单脉冲能量为250 mJ，波长为1 030 nm的高能量掺镱激光器通过固体多薄片介质进行非线性脉冲压缩的过程，及介质周期、厚度对频谱展宽的影响。在优化频谱展宽条件的过程中发现，不超过介质损伤阈值的情况下，固体薄片组的周期和厚度对频谱展宽具有正向影响。通过选取合适的介质厚度及周期，激光频谱通过熔融石英介质进行展宽，最终输出的光谱带宽达229 nm，补偿色散后，激光脉冲由500 fs压缩至16.2 fs，压缩比达到30。研究结果为实现高能量激光脉冲的非线性压缩提供了理论参考。

We demonstrate an efficient ultrafast source with 195 fs pulse duration, 54 W average power at 200 kHz repetition rate and near diffraction-limited beam quality. The compact setup incorporates a thin-disk Yb:YAG regenerative amplifier (RA) and a subsequent nonlinear pulse compression stage with periodic-layered Kerr media (PLKM), which is one of the multiple-thin-solid-plate schemes based on nonlinear resonator theory. In virtue of the formation of quasi-stationary spatial soliton in PLKM, the near diffraction-limited beam quality of the RA remained almost undisturbed after post-compression. The nonlinear pulse compression module is simple and efficient with a transmission of 96%. To the best our knowledge, for pulse energy over 200 μJ, this is the highest output power reported for the multiple-thin-solid-plate scheme. This source manifests an economical combination to mitigate the bandwidth limitations of Yb-based high-power chirped pulse amplifiers.

We demonstrate a simple method to obtain accurate optical waveforms with a gigahertz-level programmable modulation bandwidth and a watt-level output power for wideband optical control of free atoms and molecules. Arbitrary amplitude and phase modulations are transferred from microwave to light with a low-power fiber electro-optical modulator. The sub-milliwatt optical sideband is co-amplified with the optical carrier in a power-balanced fashion through a tapered semiconductor amplifier (TSA). By automatically keeping TSA near saturation in a quasi-continuous manner, typical noise channels associated with pulsed high-gain amplifications are efficiently suppressed. As an example application, we demonstrate interleaved cooling and trapping of two rubidium isotopes with coherent nanosecond pulses.

A new unsaturated wind-chime model is proposed for calculating the formation time of the diffraction rings induced by spatial self-phase modulation (SSPM) in molybdenum disulfide suspension. To optimize the traditional wind-chime model, the concentration variable of 2D materials was introduced. The results of the unsaturated wind-chime model match quite well with the SSPM experimental results of molybdenum disulfide. Based on this model, the shortest formation time of diffraction rings and their corresponding concentration and light intensity can be predicted using limited data. Theoretically, by increasing the viscosity coefficient of the solution, the response time of the diffraction ring, to reach the maximum value, can be significantly reduced. It has advanced significance in shortening the response time of photonic diodes.