Abstract
White-light continuum can be induced by the interaction of intense femtosecond laser pulses with condensed materials. By using two orthogonal polarizers, a self-induced birefringence of continuum is observed when focusing femtosecond laser pulses into bulk fused silica. That is, the generated white-light continuum is synchronously modulated anisotropically while propagating in fused silica. Time-resolved detection confirms that self-induced birefringence of continuum shows a growth and saturation feature with time evolution. By adjusting laser energy, the transmitted intensity of continuum modulated by self-induced birefringence also varies correspondingly. Morphology analysis with time evolution indicates that it is the focused femtosecond laser pulses that induce anisotropic microstructures in bulk fused silica, and the anisotropic structures at the same time modulate the generated continuum.
Highlights
White-light continuum generation is a universal process that occurs when intense ultrashort laser pulses interact with transparent gases[1], liquids[2, 3] and solids[4, 5]
We focus a femtosecond laser into bulk fused silica to induce white-light continuum and use two orthogonal polarizers to analyze the continuum
We have recorded the time evolution of self-induced birefringence of white-light continuum in fused silica. This indicates that white-light continuum is synchronously modulated anisotropically in the interaction process of a focused femtosecond laser with fused silica
Summary
White-light continuum generation is a universal process that occurs when intense ultrashort laser pulses interact with transparent gases[1], liquids[2, 3] and solids[4, 5]. The multicolored light possesses many of the same desirable properties as conventional laser: intense, collimated and coherent It has found wide applications ranging from frequency metrology[6], spectroscopy of semiconductor microstructures and photonic structures[7], optical coherence tomography[8] to time-resolved spectroscopy[9], etc. Alfano and Stanley Shapiro in 1969, extensive progress has been achieved on the experimental and theoretical understanding of ultrafast nonlinear and linear processes responsible for white-light continuum generation[7]. It seems that the mystery of white-light continuum has all been decoded. We will find more characteristics of selfinduced birefringence of continuum and decode how selfinduced birefringence of continuum proceeds in fused silica
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