Scientific article
OA Policy
English

High-power sub-picosecond filamentation at 1.03 µm with high repetition rates between 10 and 100 kHz

Published inAPL photonics, vol. 8, no. 11, 111303
Publication date2023-11-01
First online date2023-11-20
Abstract

Filamentation has extensively been explored and is well understood at repetition rates <1 kHz due to the typical availability of multi-mJ laser systems at a moderate average power. The advent of high-power Yb-lasers opened new possibilities for filamentation research. However, so far, high average power Yb systems have mostly been explored to increase the driving pulse energy to several hundreds of mJ and not at significantly higher repetition rates. In this paper, we study, for the first time, long filaments at unprecedented high repetition rates of 10, 40, and 100 kHz using a 500-W Yb-doped thin-disk amplifier driver operating with sub-700 fs pulses. We compare the filament length, density hole, and fluorescence at a constant peak power but different repetition rates and find a strong dependence on filament length and density depletion with repetition rate. Our analysis reveals the emergence of a significant stationary density depletion at repetition rates of 40 and 100 kHz. The corresponding reduction in the breakdown threshold by increasing the laser repetition rate observed in our study signifies a promising avenue for enhancing the efficiency and reliability of electric discharge triggering in various scenarios. Using capacitive plasma probe measurements, we address the limitations of fluorescence imaging-based measurements and demonstrate a systematic underestimation of filament length. This work contributes to a deeper understanding of the interplay between laser repetition rates, filamentation, and heat-driven density depletion effects from high-repetition-rate high-power laser systems and will contribute to guiding future research, making use of filaments at high repetition rates.

Research groups
Funding
  • European Commission - Fellowship Program of the NCCR MUST (National Competence Center for Research in Molecular Ultrafast Science and Technology) and the Cluster of Excellence RESOLV [801459]
  • European Commission - Compact and powerful strong-field terahertz light source for exploring water in new regimes [805202]
Citation (ISO format)
LÖSCHER, Robin et al. High-power sub-picosecond filamentation at 1.03 µm with high repetition rates between 10 and 100 kHz. In: APL photonics, 2023, vol. 8, n° 11, p. 111303. doi: 10.1063/5.0175100
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Article (Published version)
Identifiers
Journal ISSN2378-0967
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Creation23/11/2023 08:12:47
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Update27/11/2023 09:54:26
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