Quasi-phase-matching high harmonic generation using trains of pulses produced using an array of birefringent plates

Abstract

Quasi-phase-matched high harmonic generation using trains of up to 8 counter-propagating pulses is explored. For trains of up to 4 pulses the measured enhancement of the harmonic signal scales with the number of pulses N as (N + 1)², as expected. However, for trains with N > 4, no further enhancement of the harmonic signal is observed. This effect is ascribed to changes of the coherence length Lc within the generating medium. Techniques for overcoming the variation of Lc are discussed. The pressure dependence of quasi-phase-matching is investigated and the switch from true-phase-matching to quasi-phase-matching is observed.