Studies on Optical Pulse Compression to near Single-Cycle Extreme Ultrashort Duration

近十多年以来，随着超强超短激光的持续创新发展，激光脉冲宽度已经发展到以光电场振荡周期为衡量尺度的周期量级领域。近红外、乃至红外长波长的周期量级极端超快强激光脉冲已在许多前沿基础科学研究与应用领域中发挥日益重要的作用。周期量级、乃至近单周期极端超快强激光脉冲的出现，使激光与物质相互作用研究进入了周期量级极端非线性相互作用的新领域，例如与原子分子相互作用，产生单个阿秒脉冲(10-18秒)，开创并推动了阿秒物理等前沿学科的发展。在超快泵浦探测研究中，周期量级超短脉冲也被用于探测原子分子在强场中的动力学过程，成为原子分子物理学研究中的新光源、新方法。周期量级、乃至近单光周期极端超快强激光脉冲研究是超快强激光技术与物理领域的重要研究课题，也是当前超强超短激光发展与应用领域的研究热点之一。这种极端超强超快光源是探索微观世界的有力工具，其研究成果具有一作常重要的科学意义和广泛的应用前景。For the last decade with the continuous innovation in ultrafast intense laser technologies, the duration of optical laser pulses has approached the level which is counted by optical cycles of the EM field, i.e. few-cycle regime. Few-cycle intense optical laser pulses at near-IR or longer wavelength has played a crucial role in many fundamental scientific researches. The advent of the few-cycle, or even near single-cycle, laser sources leads to a new regime in the studies of nonlinear interaction between laser and substance, for example it can lead to even shorter burst of high-energy photons as single attosecond pulses in X-ray regime, opening up a new area of attosecond science. In the ultrafast pump-probe experiment, the few-cycle duration can also be used to probe the 街namics of atoms or molecules when ionized, thus becoming a new research method in atom and molecular physics