Reducing the Carrier-Envelope-Phase-dependence of High-Harmonic-Generation by Vectorial-Time-Polarization-Gating

TL;DR

The paper demonstrates that vectorial-time-polarization-gating significantly reduces the carrier-envelope phase dependence of high-harmonic generation, leading to more stable broadband spectra and polarization states.

Contribution

It introduces a novel VTPG scheme that makes high-harmonic generation less sensitive to CEP fluctuations compared to scalar schemes.

Findings

VTPG reduces CEP sensitivity of HGS and polarization.

VTPG maintains consistent recollision counts regardless of CEP.

Spectral modulations decrease with VTPG.

Abstract

A well-known shortcoming of High Harmonic Generation (HHG) is the strong dependence of the broadband HHG spectra (HGS) on the carrier envelope phase (CEP) of the driver. Here we numerically show that compared to the current well-established scalar (linearly polarized) schemes for generating broadband HGS, namely a short driver [Amplitude gating (AG)], Polarization-Gating (PG) or Time-Gating (TG), the vectorial driver of the Vectorial-Time-Polarization-Gating (VTPG) scheme renders the cutoff HGS much less sensitive to the CEP of the driver. The polarization state (helicity) of the emitted radiation is likewise CEP-resilient. Unlike scalar schemes, where the number of recollisions heavily depends on the CEP, in VTPG the CEP keeps this number almost unchanged, and only controls the partitioning of the recollisions between two orthogonal directions. This reduces the CEP-dependence of the HGS and decreases the spectral modulations. The CEP-resilience of the VTPG scheme holds promise for a variety of applications in attosecond science benefiting from quasicontinuous, helical HHG sources liberated from the necessity to stabilize the CEP of the laser.