Attosecond Pulse Technology: Generation and Characterization

Sunday, February 17, 2013
Room 306 (Hynes Convention Center)
Paul B. Corkum , University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada
Attosecond Pulse Technology:  Generation and Characterization

Paul Corkum

Joint Attosecond Science Laboratory

University of Ottawa and National Research Council of Canada

100 Sussex Drive, Ottawa, ON, Canada

Attosecond pulse generation is understood through an electron wavepacket ionizing under the influence of an intense light pulse from an atom or molecule, propagating under the influence of the light’s electric field for a fraction of a period and then recombining to the state from which it ionized.  The quantum trajectories that describe this motion map onto an interferometer – an electron interferometer created by light.  I will show how we use this process to generate attosecond pulses. 

One can add a weak additional field to perturb the quantum trajectories, thereby manipulating the interferometer.  Using interferometric concepts, I will show howthis weak field allows us to measure the space-time properties of attosecond pulses and the space-time structure of electronic wave packets.