Non-adiabatic ionization with tailored laser pulses

TL;DR

This paper introduces a method to control non-adiabatic ionization using a catalyzing state, making the process sensitive to pulse phase-details and enabling coherent control of ultra-fast ionization.

Contribution

It proposes a novel approach involving a catalyzing state to make non-adiabatic ionization controllable via pulse phase-details.

Findings

Catalyzing state enhances phase sensitivity of ionization.

Enables coherent control of ultra-fast ionization.

Potential for new control schemes in strong-field physics.

Abstract

Non-adiabatic photo-ionization is difficult to control as it relies on the derivatives of the envelope and not on phase-details of the short ionizing pulse. Here, we introduce a catalyzing state, whose presence render non-adiabatic ionization sensitive to phase-details of tailored pulses. Since a catalyzing state is in general easy to create, this opens a perspective for coherent control of ultra-fast ionization.