Harmonic generation by intense ultrashort laser pulses in rare gases

Abstract

The interaction of intense ultrashort laser pulses with a gas of argon atoms in numerically investigated. The investigation utilizes a model that solves both the time- dependent Schroedinger equation and the wave equation self- consistently. The time-dependent Schroedinger equation for a single-active electron in the effective static potential and in the potential of electron-laser interaction is solved using alternating direction implicit method. The Maxwell's wave equation is solved using an explicit finite-different technique. We show that, under some conditions, propagation effects significantly clean up the single-atom spectrum providing new spectrum with well-resolved harmonic structure.