MRI: Acquisition of a High-Pulse-Energy Ultrafast Laser System for Interdisciplinary Research

Purdue University, West Lafayette IN

Investigators

Abstract

0922987 Lucht "This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5)." Funds for the purchase of an advanced ultrafast laser system for nonlinear spectroscopy are requested. The system that specified is a Spectra-Physics Spitfire Pro 40F-5W ultrafast laser system. The pulse length of the fundamental output of the system is <40 femtoseconds (fs). The system can be operated at two different repetition rates, 1 kHz or 5 kHz. At the repetition rate of 5 kHz, the output pulse energy is >1 mJ; for the repetition rate of 1 kHz, the output pulse energy is > 5mJ. A state-of-the-art pulse shaper based on multiphoton intrapulse interference phase scan (MIIPS) is also requested. The MIIPS pulse shaper will be very useful for phase correction of Fourier-transform-limited pulses or for accurate phase-shaping using input phase functions. This ultrafast laser system user facility will be a resource for a wide range of interdisciplinary research. At present there is no comparable laser system at Purdue University. Consequently Purdue researchers are at a serious disadvantage in proposing research in emerging new fields such as diagnostic applications of femtosecond lasers, X-ray generation, and attosecond spectroscopy. Applications of the new laser system are proposed in biomedical spectroscopy, diagnostics in turbulent reacting flows, coherent phonon spectroscopy in the solid state, multiphoton spectroscopy for proton structure studies, soft X-ray generation, and attosecond spectroscopy.