Abstract
Intense picosecond pulses propagating in nonlinear media can produce frequency broadened output beams with a nearly white spectrum called supercontinuum (SC). SC generation is correlated with self-focusing (SF) and self-trapped filament formation. This chapter discusses the effect in solids, liquids, and gases. Supercontinuum cone emission (SCCE) has the same circular or linear polarisation as that of the input laser beam. Any light of circular polarisation contains a small portion of counter rotating polarisation radiation. The weaker polarisation should be self-trapped before the stronger one, resulting in light changing its polarisation into a linear. That change occurs inside the filaments where the saturation degree is maximal. The SCCE angle is independent on the lens focal length in the range 5–20 cm. The SCCE, similar to conical emission in alkali metal vapors and class II radiation, is a radiation formed on the surface of the self-trapped filaments—a process involving longitudinal momentum conservation only. The supercontinuum conical emission is generated at the surface of self-trapped filaments, and it shares its optical characteristics with other Cherenkov-type processes—conical emission in alkali metal vapors and class II Raman radiation.
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