Attosecond pulse isolation via intense laser field synthesis

Abstract

Precisely synthesized driving fields for relativistic laser-plasma interactions are shown, using particle in cell simulations, to allow for the absolute control over the temporal structure, and efficiency, of emitted attosecond pulse trains. Using a two-color driving field with an off-harmonic frequency as the second color exploits the sensitivity of the generation mechanism to the exact waveform seen by the plasma electrons. Fine control over the relative phase between the two colors, combined with the incommensurate nature of the driving field, breaks the symmetry of the input wave and allows for the selective enhancement of individual pulses in the resultant attosecond pulse train. Our results show that, by suppression of the surrounding pulses in the train, it is possible to use this technique to generate a single isolated attosecond pulse without compromising the resultant intensity as is common in other temporal gating schemes and how it can be combined with the noncollinear gating mechanism to further improve pulse isolation.