Helical filaments

Abstract

The shaping of laser-induced filamenting plasma channels into helical structures by guiding the process with a non-diffracting beam is demonstrated. This was achieved using a Bessel beam superposition to control the phase of an ultrafast laser beam possessing intensities sufficient to induce Kerr effect driven non-linear self-focusing. Several experimental methods were used to characterize the resulting beams and confirm the observed structures are laser air filaments.