Light Propagation in Field-Ionizing Media: Extreme Nonlinear Optics
Authors:
- 11 October 1999
- journal article
- research article
- Published by American Physical Society (APS) in Physical Review Letters
- Vol. 83 (15) , 2930-2933
Abstract
A novel equation for light propagation in underdense field-ionizing media is derived by extending concepts of nonlinear optics into the strong-field domain. The equation is first order in the propagation coordinate and is valid for arbitrarily short pulse durations. Solutions of the first-order wave equation are found to be in excellent agreement with solutions of the scalar wave equation. Furthermore, the polarization response of a field-ionizing medium is derived from semiclassical considerations. The polarization reveals, in agreement with experiments, a previously unrecognized contribution that is shown to significantly affect the absorption loss in the presence of ionization.Keywords
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