PPPL-5380

Laser Pulse Sharpening with Electromagnetically Induced Transparency in Plasma

Authors: K. Qu and N. Fisch

Abstract: We propose a laser-controlled plasma shutter technique to generate sharp laser pulses using a process analogous to electromagnetically-induced transparency (EIT) in atoms. The shutter is controlled by a laser with moderately strong intensity, which induces a transparency window below the cutoff frequency, and hence enables propagation of a low frequency laser pulse. Numerical simulations demonstrate it is possible to generate a sharp pulse wavefront (sub-ps) using two broad pulses in high density plasma. The technique can work in a regime that is not accessible by plasma mirrors when the pulse pedestals are stronger than the ionization intensity.

Submitted to: Physics of Plasmas
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Download PPPL-5380 2.4 MB (8 pp)
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