Study and applications of the coherence properties of supercontinuum and high-order harmonic sources

V. A. Semenova, A V Tsypkin, Путилин Сергей Эдуардович +1 more

Coherent properties of supercontinuum sources are highly significant for various applications, including low-coherence interferometry and optical frequency metrology. We propose a fast method for the spatial and temporal self-coherence of the SC measurement using Michelson interferometer without a mirror movement. Furthermore, we present self-coherence measurements of the supercontinuum, generated in microstructured fiber at 780 nm.

R.W. Smith

Jan Peřina

Mikko Närhi, Jari P. Turunen, Ari T. Friberg +1 more

We measure experimentally the second-order coherence properties of supercontinuum generated in a photonic crystal fiber. Our approach is based on measuring separately the quasicoherent and quasistationary contributions to the cross-spectral density and mutual coherence functions using a combination of interferometric and nonlinear gating techniques. This allows us to introduce two-dimensional coherence spectrograms which provide a direct characterization and convenient visualization of the spectrotemporal coherence properties. The measured second-order coherence functions are in very good agreement with numerical simulations based on the generalized nonlinear Schrödinger equation. Our results pave the way towards the full experimental characterization of supercontinuum coherence properties. More generally, they provide a generic approach for the complete experimental measurement of the coherence of broadband sources.

John G. Meadors

Hongbin Lei, Jinping Yao, Jing Zhao +11 more

Supercontinuum (SC) light sources hold versatile applications in many fields ranging from imaging microscopic structural dynamics to achieving frequency comb metrology. Although such broadband light sources are readily accessible in the visible and near infrared regime, the ultraviolet (UV) extension of SC spectrum is still challenging. Here, we demonstrate that the joint contribution of strong field ionization and quantum resonance leads to the unexpected UV continuum radiation spanning the 100 nm bandwidth in molecular nitrogen ions. Quantum coherences in a bunch of ionic levels are found to be created by dynamic Stark-assisted multiphoton resonances following tunneling ionization. We show that the dynamical evolution of the coherence-enhanced polarization wave gives rise to laser-assisted continuum emission inside the laser field and free-induction decay after the laser field, which jointly contribute to the SC generation together with fifth harmonics. As proof of principle, we also show the application of the SC radiation in the absorption spectroscopy. This work offers an alternative scheme for constructing exotic SC sources, and opens up the territory of ionic quantum optics in the strong-field regime.