TY - JOUR
T1 - Filamentation of long-wave infrared pulses in the atmosphere [Invited]
AU - Tochitsky, Sergei
AU - Welch, Eric
AU - Panagiotopoulos, Paris
AU - Polyanskiy, Misha
AU - Pogorelsky, Igor
AU - Kolesik, Miroslav
AU - Koch, Stephan W.
AU - Moloney, Jerome V.
AU - Joshi, Chan
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Optical Society of America.
PY - 2019
Y1 - 2019
N2 - Filamentation of a high-power laser beam in air opens the possibility of the diffraction-compensated propagation of a laser beam over long distances and as such is being considered for remote stand-off detection, lightning control, free-space communications, and long-range projection of high-energy pulses. Switching to long-wave infrared (LWIR) range for filamentation, as shown in recent experiments, allows for generation of a single centimeter-diameter channel in air that, in comparison with a short-wavelength laser filament, has 4 orders of magnitude larger cross section and guides many joules of pulse energy over multiple Rayleigh distances at a clamped intensity of ∼1012 W/cm2. Self-guiding of LWIR pulses in air arises from the balance between self-focusing, diffraction, and defocusing caused by free carriers generated via many-body Coulomb-induced ionization which effectively decrease the molecular polarizability during the long-wavelength laser pulse. Understanding where this new ionization regime plays a role, below the threshold of the well-adopted single-atom tunnel ionization in gases, could become a new frontier in strong-field interactions. This paper offers an overview of the atmospheric filamentation research at long-wave infrared wavelengths.
AB - Filamentation of a high-power laser beam in air opens the possibility of the diffraction-compensated propagation of a laser beam over long distances and as such is being considered for remote stand-off detection, lightning control, free-space communications, and long-range projection of high-energy pulses. Switching to long-wave infrared (LWIR) range for filamentation, as shown in recent experiments, allows for generation of a single centimeter-diameter channel in air that, in comparison with a short-wavelength laser filament, has 4 orders of magnitude larger cross section and guides many joules of pulse energy over multiple Rayleigh distances at a clamped intensity of ∼1012 W/cm2. Self-guiding of LWIR pulses in air arises from the balance between self-focusing, diffraction, and defocusing caused by free carriers generated via many-body Coulomb-induced ionization which effectively decrease the molecular polarizability during the long-wavelength laser pulse. Understanding where this new ionization regime plays a role, below the threshold of the well-adopted single-atom tunnel ionization in gases, could become a new frontier in strong-field interactions. This paper offers an overview of the atmospheric filamentation research at long-wave infrared wavelengths.
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U2 - 10.1364/JOSAB.36.000G40
DO - 10.1364/JOSAB.36.000G40
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:85073053597
SN - 0740-3224
VL - 36
SP - G40-G51
JO - Journal of the Optical Society of America B: Optical Physics
JF - Journal of the Optical Society of America B: Optical Physics
IS - 10
ER -