Achievement

IGERT participants at the University of Colorado - Department of Physics have demonstrated experimentally for the first time that by combining laser pulse self-compression with high harmonic generation within a single gas-filled waveguide, harmonics from multiply ionized species can be generated. The cutoff photon energy in argon was significantly extended to 540eV photon energies for the first time, with a higher brightness than that observed in neutral He for the same laser input energy. In the future, high harmonic emission can be extended to very high photon energies using multiply charged ions in combination with quasi phase matching and mid-infrared techniques. Due to its relatively smaller size, this can become a very unique light source for imaging in the soft-X ray range.