Generation of high energy density by fs-laser-induced confined microexplosion

Confined microexplosion produced by a tightly focused fs-laser pulse inside transparent material proved to be an efficient and inexpensive method for achieving high energy density up to several MJ per cm3 in the laboratory table-top experiments. First studies already confirmed the generation of TPa-range pressure, the formation of novel super-dense material phases and revealed an unexpected phenomenon of spatial separation of ions with different masses in hot non-equilibrium plasma of confined microexplosion. In this paper, we show that the intense focused pulse propagation accompanied by a gradual increase of ionization nonlinearity changes the profile and spectrum of the pulse. We demonstrate that the motion of the ionization front in the direction opposite to the pulse propagation reduces the absorbed energy density. The voids in our experiments with fused silica produced by the microexplosion-generated pressure above Young's modulus indicate, however, that laser fluence up to 50 times above the ionization threshold is effectively absorbed in the bulk of the material. The analysis shows that the ion separation is enhanced in the non-ideal plasma of microexplosion. These findings open new avenues for the studies of high-pressure material transformations and warm dense matter conditions by confined microexplosion produced by intense fs-laser

Laser-induced microexplosion confined in a bulk of silica: formation of nanovoids

We report on the nanovoid formation inside synthetic silica, viosil, by single femtosecond pulses of 30–100nJ energy, 800nm wavelength, and 180fs duration. It is demonstrated that the void is formed as a result of shock and rarefaction waves at pulse power much lower than the threshold of self-focusing. The shock-compressed region around the nanovoid is demonstrated to have higher chemical reactivity. This was used to reveal the extent of the shock-compressed region by wet etching. Application potential of nanostructuring of dielectrics is discussed

Modification of refractive index by a single femtosecond pulse confined inside a bulk of a photorefractive crystal

We demonstrate that the interaction of intense femtosecond pulse with photorefractive crystal at conditions close to the optical-breakdown threshold differs drastically from that of long pulse and cw illumination. Our theoretical estimations show that the high number density of excited electrons modifies the dielectric function leading to the transient negative change in the refractive index, Δn/ n0 ∼- 10-2 that vanishes on nanosecond time scale. Moreover, the high-frequency laser field, two orders of magnitude larger than the field of spontaneous polarization, prevents the stationary charge distribution during the pulse. The diffusion and recombination of charge carriers continues over a nanosecond time scale, after the end of the pulse. The main driving force for the current after the pulse is the field of spontaneous polarization in the ferroelectric medium: the current terminates when the field of charge separation balances this field. We show here that the stationary modification of refractive index according to this model is then independent of the polarization of the pump light beam, in agreement with experiments, and saturates at Δn 10-3 in semiquantitative fit to the experimental data

Dielectric geometric phase optical elements from femtosecond direct laser writing

We propose to use femtosecond direct laser writing technique to realize dielectric optical elements from photo-resist materials for the generation of structured light from purely geometrical phase transformations. This is illustrated by the fabrication and characterization of spin-to-orbital optical angular momentum couplers generating optical vortices of topological charge from 1 to 20. In addition, the technique is scalable and allows obtaining microscopic to macroscopic flat optics. These results thus demonstrate that direct 3D photopolymerization technology qualifies for the realization of spin-controlled geometric phase optical elements.Comment: 6 figure

Microfabrication of Three-Dimensional Structures in Polymer and Glass by Femtosecond Pulses

We report three-dimensional laser microfabrication, which enables microstructuring of materials on the scale of 0.2-1 micrometers. The two different types of microfabrication demonstrated and discussed in this work are based on holographic recording, and light-induced damage in transparent dielectric materials. Both techniques use nonlinear optical excitation of materials by ultrashort laser pulses (duration < 1 ps).Comment: This is a proceedings paper of bi-lateral Conf. (Republics of China & Lithuania) on Optoelectronics and Magnetic Materials, Taipei, May 25-26, 2002.