Time- and frequency-resolved detection of atomic coherence in the regime of strong-field interaction with intense femtosecond laser pulses

Journal Article · Tue Mar 15 00:00:00 EDT 2011 · Physical Review. A

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVA.83.033417· OSTI ID:21541323

Konorov, S O ^[1]; Hepburn, J W; Milner, V ^[1]

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1. Department of Chemistry, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia (Canada)

Understanding the effect of strong laser pulses on the evolution of an atomic or molecular wave function is important in the context of coherent control in the strong-field regime, when power broadening and dynamic Stark shifts become comparable with or bigger than the bandwidth of the control field. We experimentally demonstrate the method of complete characterization of a complex-valued amplitude of a quantum state driven by a strong two-photon field. The method is based on coherent scattering of a weak probe pulse from the strong-field-induced atomic coherence, followed by the detection of the time- and frequency-resolved parametric four-wave-mixing signal. We show that the proposed technique corresponds to a cross-correlation frequency-resolved optical gating (XFROG) of the highly perturbed evolution of an atomic quantum state. Utilizing the XFROG retrieval algorithm, we determine both the amplitude and phase of an atomic wave function at any time moment throughout the interaction with the driving field. The direct retrieval of the time-dependent phase of the wave function, rather than the population dynamics only, enables us to observe the strong-field effects with arbitrary time and frequency resolution.

• OSTI ID: 21541323
• Journal Information: Physical Review. A, Vol. 83, Issue 3; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.83.033417; (c) 2011 American Institute of Physics; ISSN 1050-2947
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
74 ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR PHYSICS
ALGORITHMS
AMPLITUDES
COHERENT SCATTERING
CORRELATION FUNCTIONS
FREQUENCY MIXING
INTERACTIONS
LASER RADIATION
PHOTONS
POPULATION DYNAMICS
PULSES
RESOLUTION
SIGNALS
TIME DEPENDENCE
WAVE FUNCTIONS
BOSONS
ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION
ELEMENTARY PARTICLES
FUNCTIONS
MASSLESS PARTICLES
MATHEMATICAL LOGIC
RADIATIONS
SCATTERING