Multiorbital effects in high-order harmonic emission from CO$_2$

TL;DR

This study uses numerical simulations to analyze the multiorbital contributions to high-order harmonic generation in CO$_2$, revealing that individual orbitals can produce strongly elliptic harmonics despite a small overall ellipticity.

Contribution

It demonstrates the significant role of multiple valence orbitals and their interference effects in shaping the ellipticity of high-order harmonics in CO$_2$.

Findings

Multiple valence orbitals contribute to harmonic emission.

Some orbitals produce strongly elliptic harmonics.

Overall harmonic ellipticity remains small due to interference and alignment effects.

Abstract

We study the ellipticity of high-order harmonics emitted from CO$_2$ molecule driven by linearly polarized laser fields using numerical simulations within the time-dependent density functional theory. We find that the overall ellipticity of the harmonics is small, which is in agreement with experimental data. On the other hand, our analysis of the numerical results indicates that several valence orbitals contribute significantly to the harmonic emission and some of these contributions show a strong ellipticity of the harmonics. The small ellipticity in the total harmonics signal arises from a combination of factors, namely, the fact that harmonic emission from different orbitals is strongest at different alignment angles of the molecular axis with respect to the laser polarization direction, as well as interference effects and a strong laser coupling between several inner valence orbitals.