Time gated ion microscopy of light-atom interactions

TL;DR

This paper reviews a novel spatially resolved ionization measurement technique that enhances understanding of laser-matter interactions in ultra-short pulse experiments, enabling detailed focus diagnostics and nonlinear ionization studies.

Contribution

It introduces a new approach for spatially resolving photoionization yields, allowing in-situ focus diagnostics and advanced ultrafast laser interaction studies.

Findings

Enables in-situ focus diagnostics.

Allows quantitative analysis of ionization processes.

Supports single-shot pump-probe and autocorrelation measurements.

Abstract

The development of ultra-short intense laser sources in the visible and extreme ultraviolet (XUV) spectral range led to fascinating studies in laser-matter interactions and attosecond science. In the majority of these studies the system under investigation interacts with a focused laser beam, which ionizes the system. The ionization products are usually measured by devices, which spatiotemporally integrate the ionization signal originating from the entire focal area, discarding in this way valuable information about the ionization dynamics that take place in the interaction volume. Here, we review a recently developed approach in measuring the spatially resolved photoionization yields resulting from the interaction of infrared (IR)/XUV ultra-short laser pulses in gas phase media. We show how this approach enables a) the in-situ focus diagnostic, b) quantitative studies of linear and non-linear ionization processes in the IR/XUV regime, c) single-shot XUV-pump-XUV-probe studies and d) single-shot 2nd-order XUV autocorrelation measurements. The article has been published in J. Opt. 20, 024018 (2018) (doi.org/10.1088/2040-8986/aaa326).