Modification of laser-induced state in atomic attosecond transient absorption by the XUV pulse pair

Abstract

Attosecond transient absorption (ATA) has been developed as an all-optical technique for probing electron dynamics in matter. Here we present a scheme that can modify the laser-induced state and the corresponding ATA spectrum via excitation by a pair of XUV attosecond pulses and by a time-delayed mid-infrared (MIR) laser probe. Different from the scheme of the electronic excitation by a single XUV attosecond pulse, the application of a pair of XUV pulses provides extra degrees of freedom, such as the time delay and the intensity ratio between two XUV pulses, which make it possible to adjust the pump process, resulting in the modification of the ATA spectrum. We show that by varying the time delay between the two XUV pulses, the population of the dark state and the ATA spectrum of the laser-induced state have periodic modulations. We also demonstrate that the peak of the ATA spectrum of the laser-induced state appears at a fixed time delay between the XUV pair and the MIR laser when the intensity ratio is large, and it changes with the time delay when the intensity ratio is small, which can be related to either one of two peaks in the population of the dark state.