Pulse stretcher for chirped-pulse amplification with high-power and spectral transmissions

Abstract

Pulse stretcher based on a single diffraction grating and an Offner telescope is modified using an off-plane (conical) diffraction to reach the Littrow angle of diffraction. We present a high power transmission over a broad spectral bandwidth of ultrashort laser pulses. The slight conical diffraction does not involve significant optical aberrations of system consisting of a pulse stretcher and a pulse compressor. It is verified by ray-tracing calculations and by the experimental pulse stretching of 10-fs laser pulses to ~300 ps and by a back compression of the stretched pulses. The described pulse stretcher and compressor can improve performance of systems for chirped pulse amplification.© (2005) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.