Spatial dispersion of intense terahertz generation in lithium niobate

Shusu Chai; Xiaojun Wu; Jinglong Ma; Baolong Zhang; Liming Chen; Yutong Li

doi:10.1117/12.2502421

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9 November 2018 Spatial dispersion of intense terahertz generation in lithium niobate

Shusu Chai, Xiaojun Wu, Jinglong Ma, Baolong Zhang, Liming Chen, Yutong Li

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Proceedings Volume 10826, Infrared, Millimeter-Wave, and Terahertz Technologies V; 108261M (2018) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2502421
Event: SPIE/COS Photonics Asia, 2018, Beijing, China

Abstract

Tilted pulse front technique in lithium niobate has been widely used for strong-field terahertz generation in laboratories and with this method, lots of strong terahertz field induced phenomena have been observed. However, for mJ-level pulse energy, focused electric field >10 MV/cm solid state terahertz sources, there are still many scientific and technical challenges waiting to be explored. For real applications, the properties of intense terahertz source is very important, such as spatial chirp effect. In this work, we systematically investigate the spatial dispersion of intense terahertz generation process in lithium niobate. We also observe obvious non-uniform spatial terahertz frequency distribution with respect to the emission plane using a knife-edge measurement. Higher frequency generation is obtained when the emission spot is far away from the cutting edge of the crystal, while lower frequency emission is detected when the emission spot is close to the crystal edge. This phenomenon is contrary to the original predicts, of which higher frequencies will experience longer propagation distance resulting in weak contribution. The possible mechanism is the nonlinear distortion effect caused by high energy laser pumping. Our study is very important and useful for building intense terahertz systems with the applications in extreme terahertz science, and time-resolved nonlinear spectroscopy.

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Shusu Chai, Xiaojun Wu, Jinglong Ma, Baolong Zhang, Liming Chen, and Yutong Li "Spatial dispersion of intense terahertz generation in lithium niobate", Proc. SPIE 10826, Infrared, Millimeter-Wave, and Terahertz Technologies V, 108261M (9 November 2018); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2502421

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