Conference paper
Experimental verification of the intrinsic ultrafast delayed nonlinearity of gold
Surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) in plasmonic metal waveguides can excite a third-order nonlinear response [1] much akin the well-known self-phase modulation (SPM) and two-photon absorption seen in light propagating in dielectric waveguides. In metals, the nonlinearity mainly arises as a self-acting effect: after absorption of the incident light the nonlinearity arises due to hot-electron contributions from changes of the intrinsic electronic lattice temperature.
Using the so-called two-temperature model (TTM), the characteristic thermalization time of free-electrons in noble metals, such as gold, is described by an intrinsic delayed response function acting on a femtosecond-picosecond scale [1], explaining why the measured χ(3) values of gold are affected by the laser pulse duration.
Here we show experimental data performed using picosecond [2] and femtosecond [3] laser pulses that for the first time allows to quantitatively connect the measured χ(3) values with the nonlinear coefficient of a nonlinear Schrödinger equation (NLSE) using the TTM to derive the nonlinearity.
| Language: | English |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | IEEE |
| Year: | 2017 |
| Pages: | 1-1 |
| Proceedings: | The 2017 European Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics |
| ISBN: | 1509067361 , 150906737X , 150906737x , 9781509067367 and 9781509067374 |
| Types: | Conference paper |
| DOI: | 10.1109/CLEOE-EQEC.2017.8087666 |
| ORCIDs: | Bache, Morten and Lavrinenko, Andrei |
Au Gold Lattices NLSE Optical waveguides Plasmons SPM Schrodinger equation Surface waves Temperature measurement characteristic thermalization time dielectric waveguides femtosecond laser pulses femtosecond-picosecond scale free-electrons gold high-speed optical techniques hot-electron contributions incident light intrinsic delayed response function intrinsic electronic lattice temperature intrinsic ultrafast delayed nonlinearity laser beams laser pulse duration light propagation nonlinear Schrödinger equation nonlinear coefficient nonlinear equations optical waveguides picosecond laser pulses plasmonic metal waveguides plasmonics polaritons self-acting effect self-phase modulation surface plasmon polaritons surface plasmons thermo-optical effects third-order nonlinear response two-photon absorption two-photon processes two-temperature model
