Analysis on the minimum structure of harmonic spectra from MgO crystals

Abstract

Recent theoretical and experimental findings have demonstrated the minimum characteristic in the harmonic spectrum of bulk MgO crystals subjected to intense laser pulses. However, the dominant mechanism behind this minimum structure is still under debate. This study simulates the harmonic spectrum from a MgO crystal in a linearly polarized laser pulse by solving multi-band semiconductor Bloch equations. The results show that the minimum feature at 20 eV in the MgO harmonic spectra from 1700 and 800 nm laser pulses is due to band dispersion and interference between interband harmonics. Notably, the disappearance of the minimum structure at 14 eV in the harmonic spectrum from the 800 nm laser is attributed to the intensity suppression of higher energy harmonics, caused by decreased electron population at the boundary of the first Brillouin zone in the multi-band case. These findings offer insights into the spectral structure of solid-state harmonics, contributing to the all-optical reconstruction of the crystal band based on its harmonic spectrum.