Soliton compression of femtosecond pulses in quadratic media

Abstract

We describe efficient soliton compression of femtosecond pulses by use of cascade quadratic nonlinearity and normal dispersion in quadratic media. Pulse compression by a factor of ∼3 is achieved in ∼30-mm-long beta-barium borate at a wavelength of 800 nm. We investigate the dependence of compression performance on phase mismatch, input intensity, and propagation length. The compressed pulses are fully characterized by use of the frequency-resolved optical gating method.