Stable operation of a synchronously pumped colliding-pulse mode-locked ring dye laser

Pulses of 100-fsec duration are obtained by synchronous pumping of a colliding-pulse ring dye laser with a mode-locked Ar+-ion laser. Stable operation of the synchronously pumped colliding-pulse mode-locked laser over hours was obtained by a suitable choice of the distance between the gain and the absorber in combination with an appro-priate pump-pulse sequence. Passive mode locking of a ring dye laser by the inter-action of two counterpropagating pulses in a thin sat-urable absorber (colliding-pulse mode locking) yields femtosecond laser pulses. ' In these lasers the gain medium (Rhodamine 6G) is pumped by a cw Ar+-ion laser. The saturable absorber (DODCI, 3,3-diethyl-oxadicarbocyanine iodide) synchronizes two counter-propagating pulses meeting in the absorber jet stream. The colliding pulses form a transient grating, which synchronizes and stabilizes the pulses.2 In order to ensure equal amplification for both counterpropagatin

Femtosecond spectroscopy of the first events of the photochemical cycle in bacteriorhodopsin

The first steps in the photochemistry of bacteriorhodopsin (BR) are investigated with light pulses of 160 fs duration. Four samples are studied: (i) the purple membrane, (ii) deuterated purple membrane, (iii) BR trimers and (iv) BR monomers. In all samples the first intermediate J is formed within 430±50 fs. No isotope effect is observed in the formation of J upon deuteration, in contrast to previous reports with much higher excitation energies. Thus proton movement to or from the retinal Schiff's base is not relevant during the first step. Comparing the data for trimeric and monomeric BR suggests an upper limit of 50 fs for the transfer of excitation energy from the excitonically coupled trimer to a single retinal chromophore

Trion dynamics in coupled double quantum wells. Electron density effects

We have studied the coherent dynamics of injected electrons when they are either free or bounded both in excitons and in trions (charged excitons). We have considered a remotely doped asymmetric double quantum well where an excess of free electrons and the direct created excitons generate trions. We have used the matrix density formalism to analyze the electron dynamics for different concentration of the three species. Calculations show a significant modification of the free electron inter-sublevel oscillations cWe have studied the coherent dynamics of injected electrons when they are aused by electrons bound in excitons and trions. Based on the present calculations we propose a method to detect trions through the emitted electromagnetic radiation or the current density.Comment: 14 pages, 13 figure