Search results for "optical Kerr effect."
showing 10 items of 14 documents
Experimental investigation of the optical Kerr effect at large laser intensity: impact on the propagation of a short and intense laser pulse
2010
Talk given by O. Faucher; International audience
Measurement of high order Kerr refractive index of major air components
2009
International audience; We measure the instantaneous electronic nonlinear refractive index of N2 , O2 , and Ar at room temperature for a 90 fs and 800 nm laser pulse. Measurements are calibrated by post-pulse molecular alignment through a polarization technique. At low intensity, quadratic coefficients n2 are determined. At higher intensities, a strong negative contribution with a higher nonlinearity appears, which leads to an overall negative nonlinear Kerr refractive index in air above 26 TW/cm2 .
Higher-order Kerr terms allow ionization-free filamentation in gases
2010
Talk given by J. Kasparian; International audience; Higher-order nonlinear indices, rather than plasma, provide the main defocusing contribution to filamentation in gases at 800 nm. Developing generalized Miller formulae, we discuss the generality of this as a function of the laser wavelength
Stratégies de contrôle pour la manipulation spatiale de molécules
2011
Talk given by E. Hertz; National audience
Observation d'effets Kerr d'ordres élevés (HOKE) dans les gaz
2011
Talk given by O. Faucher; National audience
Alignment of linear molecules by short duration laser pulses
2005
Alignment of linear molecules is efficiently induced by strong linearly polarized laser pulses. In the case of short pulses with respect to molecular rotation, periodic alignment appears in field-free conditions after the extinction of the field. This manuscript presents three techniques where the value of allows to quantify alignment without molecular dissociation nor additional alignment. They use a weak time-delayed probe pulse which experiences the optical properties of an aligned sample and shows modification of its characteristics. The first of them measures a depolarization due to the birefringence of the sample. The second one is based on the defocusing produced by the spatial distr…
Higher-order Kerr terms allow ionization-free filamentation in gases
2010
International audience; We show that higher-order nonlinear indices (n4 , n6 , n8 , n10) provide the main defocusing contribution to self-channeling of ultrashort laser pulses in air and Argon at 800 nm, in contrast with the previously accepted mechanism of filamentation where plasma was considered as the dominant defocusing process. Their consideration allows to reproduce experimentally observed intensities and plasma densities in self-guided filaments.
ALIGNEMENT UNI ET TRIDIMENSIONNEL DE MOLÉCULES PAR IMPULSION LASER FEMTOSECONDE
2007
This thesis is devoted to the study of the alignment of linear and asymmetric top molecules generated by an intense laser pulse. In the case of short pulses with respect to molecular rotation, periodic alignment appears in field-free conditions after the extinction of the field. We study theoretically and experimentally the effects of intensity, temperature and polarization of the electric field on produced alignment. If the field is linearly polarized, the interaction leads to the alignment of the most polarizable axis of the molecule. If the field is elliptically polarized, the pulse can generate a simultaneous alignment of the three principal axes of inertia of an asymmetric top molecule…
Spectral dependence of purely-Kerr driven filamentation in air and argon
2010
5 pags, 4 figs.-- PACS number(s): 42.65.Jx, 42.65.Tg, 78.20.Ci. -- Publisher error corrected 27 September 2010, Erratum Phys. Rev. A 82, 039905 (2010): https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.82.033826
Observation of laser-induced field-free permanent planar alignment of molecules
2011
International audience; Permanent planar alignment of gas-phase linear molecules is achieved by a pair of delayed perpendicularly polarized short laser pulses. The experiment is performed in a supersonic jet, ensuring a relatively high number density of molecules with moderately low rotational temperature. The effect is optically probed on a femtosecond time scale by the use of a third short pulse, enabling a time-resolved birefringence detection performed successively in two perpendicular planes of the laboratory frame. The technique allows for an unambiguous estimation of the molecular planar delocalization produced within the polarization plane of the pulse pair after the turn-off of the…