When
Where
Please note, the event will be live-streamed—however, it will not be recorded
Recording is Strictly Prohibited
Register for the Zoom Webinar!
Title
High Intensity Fiber lasers for Nonlinear Optics
Abstract
Ti:sapphire lasers offer the largest bandwidths and therefore the shortest pulses. The highest laser intensities have been achieved using Chirped Pulse Amplification (CPA) of large diameter solid state lasers. CPA was needed to avoid damage from the nonlinear process of self-focusing. The disadvantage of solid-state lasers is the limited average power. On the other hand, diode pumped fiber laser systems offer significantly higher average power than solid state lasers. Self-focusing is eliminated in single mode fibers by guiding and so nonlinear optics can be beneficial rather than detrimental and used to broaden the gain bandwidth. Single fiber laser amplifiers will not reach the highest intensities offered by solid state lasers, but in this talk, I will discuss developing fiber laser amplifiers for nonlinear optical interactions such as mid-infrared generation and laser acceleration of electrons that require high intensity and benefit from high average power.
Bio
Donna Strickland is a professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Waterloo and is one of the recipients of the Nobel Prize in Physics 2018 for developing chirped pulse amplification with Gérard Mourou, her PhD supervisor at the time. They published this Nobel-winning research in 1985 when Strickland was a PhD student at the University of Rochester in New York state. Together they paved the way toward the most intense laser pulses ever created.
Strickland was a research associate at the National Research Council Canada, a physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and a member of technical staff at Princeton University. In 1997, she joined the University of Waterloo, where her ultrafast laser group develops high-intensity laser systems for nonlinear optics investigations.
Strickland was named a Companion of the Order of Canada. She is a recipient of a Sloan Research Fellowship, a Premier’s Research Excellence Award and a Cottrell Scholar Award. Strickland served as the president of the Optical Society (OSA) in 2013. She is a fellow of OSA and SPIE, the Royal Society of Canada and the Royal Society. She is an honorary fellow of the Canadian Academy of Engineering as well as the Institute of Physics. She is an international member of the US National Academy of Science.
Strickland earned a PhD in optics from the University of Rochester and a B.Eng. from McMaster University.
Can't Join Us In Person?
Register for the Zoom Webinar!
Subscribe to Upcoming Colloquium Announcements
Visit our website for future lecture dates and speaker information