Stabilizing the carrier–envelope phase of an amplified Ti:sapphire laser pulse to a noise level of sub-100 mrad

Abstract

To generate an intense femtosecond pulse with an energy of several mJ or more, the pulse must be sufficiently stretched and compressed using grating-based optics in a chirped pulse amplification system. However, the stability of the carrier–envelope phase (CEP) is readily degraded by movement of the diffraction gratings due to vibration caused by pump lasers and other equipment. By suppressing the vibration and acoustic waves, we reduced the CEP noise to much less than 100 mrad (rms). With feedback control using a wedge pair with a single shot f - 2 f interferometer (1 ms integration time), we were able to stabilize the CEP, achieving a CEP noise of 58 mrad (rms) at a pulse energy of 0.5 mJ and 99 mrad (rms) at a pulse energy of 7 mJ and a repetition rate of 1 kHz. We also analyzed the effects of vibration on the pulse stretcher and compressor using a geometrical optics approach and found that roof mirrors were the most influential.