Douglass Schumacher 4180 Physics Research Building. Office hours by appointment. Phone: 292-7035 schumacher.60@osu.edu Physics 8820 (Special Topics) Tuesday: 8:30 - 10 am. Thursday: 4:30 - 6 pm. Denney Hall, Room 262. Text: Ultrashort Laser Pulse Phenomena Second Edition Jean-Claude Diels and Wolfgang Rudolph |
Course Outline:
1) Linear pulse propagation
2) Non-linear optics
3) Characterization of short pulses
4) Short pulse generation and amplification
5) Experimental techniques using short pulses
Information on this page: | Useful Web Sites | Applets | General Links |
Other class pages: | Book References | Journal References |
Tutorials: Using Math Packages To Perform Fourier Transforms
Origin by Yukti Aggarwal. |
Matlab by Elijah Kemp, Andy Krygier and Chris Willis. Includes sample code. |
Origin by Chuang Tan and Zheyun Liu. |
Mathematica by Steven Schoun. |
Mathematica by Justin Young. Includes a notebook and a practice waveform. |
Rick Trebino Group Page This is an unusally useful site from one of the leaders of the field. There are tutorials, lecture notes and even stories. If you plan to be in this field, you should explore. |
Femtosecond Laser Pulses: Linear Properties, Manipulation, Generation and Measurement is an excellent discussion covering the first several weeks of class. It's (a draft?) from the Springer Handbook of Lasers and Optics. It uses the notation of D&R but is, I think, more concise and clear. |
NASA database on laser materials. Start with 'Contents'. Includes spectra, damage thresholds, nonlinear coefficients and other useful information. |
Companies With Data Referred To In Class (needed for some homework assignments)
Properties of optical glass (pocket catalog) | "[A]n excerpt of the important properties of the optical glasses from our main catalog," but for our purposes the notation/terminology discussion is especially important. See sections 1 and 9. |
Optical Catalog | Excel file containing optical properites, including Sellmeir coefficients, of many glass types including bk7, sf10, ... |
Optical Catalog | PDF file listing optical properties of many glass types. |
Gooch & Housego - Used to be known as Cleveland Crystals, Inc. They don't seem to provide data sheets anymore, at least not that I can find, but they're an Ohio company so I'm keeping the listing. |
Eksma Optics - A well known manufacturer. Eksma has some material properties lists. Here are some data sheets on KD*P and BBO (click on the 'Specifications' tab). |
You can get material data from the literature, of course, and from various programs available. We'll use these resources, as well. |
Most of these links have died or have other problems. I'll see if I can find replacements.
Fourier Synthesis | Mostly for your amusement. Uses your speakers so you can hear the result. |
Fourier Synthesis | Another one with sound. See if you can "modelock". |
Fermat's Principle | Illustrated for reflection and refraction. |
Group velocity and phase velocity | Simple illustration of how a wave looks when differing speeds are used. Try it at the highest frequency and follow the motion near the node in the envelope function. |
Simple group velocity demonstration | Simple illustration based on the superposition of two waves. |
Group Velocity Demonstration | Allows you to superpose two arbitrary waves specified using C-like syntax. |
Subluminal | Illustrates how a pulse can appear to propagate faster than light. (The author should have named it "superluminal" I suppose.) |
Gaussian Modes Illustrated | Computer generated idealized case, as opposed to the handout I gave you. |
TEM00 mode | It's hard to focus your eyes on a true TEM00 Gaussian mode. |
Stability Diagram of an Optical Cavity | Shows your location in the diagram as you modify cavity parameters. Includes a model of the laser cavity below the diagram. |
Rays Trajectories in an Optical Cavity | Ray trace analysis of a two mirror cavity with adjustable parameters. |
Cavity Mode | Better version of the above. Find a configuration that gives you a large mode everywhere. Try other variations. |
Laser dynamics | You select the pump/loss/decay parameters and it solves the rate equations. Excellent for understanding self-Q-switching, transient response, and the approach to steady-state. |
Societies | Journals | Articles | Laser Tutorials | For the Hobbyist |
APS -- Americal Physical Society |
OSA -- Optical Society of America |
IEEE -- Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers |
SPIE -- The International Society for Optical Engineering |
OSA Online Journals Applied Optics, JOSA A, JOSA B, Optics Express, and Optics Letters. |
IEEE Journal Of Quantum Electronics |
Optics and Photonics News |
Laser Focus World |
Photonics |
The Industrial Physicist (American Institute of Physics) often has articles of importance to lasers and optics. |
Science magazine has a special issue on coherence. See it here |
Rami Arieli - The Laser Adventure - extensive, with applets and discussion of a variety of applications. |
The Homebuilt Lasers Page |
The Laser, Optics and Holography Ring |