High energy high repetition rate compact picosecond Holmium YLF laser for mid-IR OPCPA pumping

Abstract

The development of coherent light sources with emission in the mid-IR is currently undergoing a remarkable revolution. The mid-IR spectral range has always been of tremendous interest, mainly to spectroscopists, due to the ability of mid-IR light to access rotational and vibrational resonances of molecules which give rise to superb sensitivity upon optical probing [1-3]. Previously, high energy resolution was achieved with narrowband lasers or parametric sources, but the advent of frequency comb sources has revolutionized spectroscopy by providing high energy resolution within the frequency comb structure of the spectrum and at the same time broadband coverage and short pulse duration [4-6]. Such carrier to envelope phase (CEP) controlled light waveforms, when achieved at ultrahigh intensity, give rise to extreme effects such as the generation of isolated attosecond pulses in the vacuum to extreme ultraviolet range (XUV) [7]. Motivated largely by the vast potential of attosecond science, the development of ultraintense few-cycle and CEP stable sources has intensified [8], and it was recognized that coherent soft X-ray radiation could be generated when driving high harmonic generation (HHG) with long wavelength sources [9-11]. Recently, based on this concept, the highest waveform controlled soft X-ray flux [12] and isolated attosecond pulse emission at 300 eV [13] was demonstrated via HHG from a 1850 nm, sub-2-cycle source [14]. Within strong field physics, long wavelength scaling may lead to further interesting physics such as the direct reshaping of the carrier field [15], scaling of quantum path dynamics [16], the breakdown of the dipole approximation [17] or direct laser acceleration [18]. The experimental development of long wavelength light sources therefore holds great promise in many fields of science and will lead to numerous applications beyond strong field physics and attosecond science. In this paper, we present results about a high energy picosecond Holmium YLF laser developed in order to be used as the puming laser for the first mid-IR optical parametric chirped pulse amplifier (OPCPA) operating at a center wavelength of 7 μm with output parameters suitable already for strong-field experiments. It is also the first demonstration of an Optical Parametric Chirped Pulse Amplifier (OPCPA) using a 2 μm laser pump source which enables the use of nonoxide nonlinear crystals with typically limited transparency at 1 mm wavelength. This new OPCPA system is alloptically synchronized and generates 0.2 mJ energy, CEP stable optical pulses. The pulses are currently compressed to sub-8 optical cycles but support a sub-4 cycle pulse duration. The discrepancy in compression is due to uncompensated higher order phase from the grating compressor which will be addressed in the future.