Role of the dressed and bound states on below-threshold harmonic generation of He atom

High-order harmonic generation below ionization threshold of He atom in the laser field is investigated by solving the three-dimensional time-dependent Schrodinger equation. An angular momentum-dependent model potential of He atom was used for getting the accurate energy levels of singlet states. The satellite-peak structures of the below-threshold harmonic generation(BTHG) of He are observed. We analyze the emission properties of the BTHG by employing a synchrosqueezing transform technique. We find that the satellite-peak structures have two types related to two kinds of transitions. One is the transition of the dressed states of the excited states, the other is the transition between the excited states and the ground state in the field-free case. Furthermore, our results show that the maximum Stark shift of the 2 p state is about 0.9 Up(penderomotive energy), and that of the 4 p state is about 1.0 Up. It indicates that the energy difference between some satellite-and main-peaks of the BTHG can be used to measure the maximum Stark shift of the excited states of He atom in the laser field.

Broadband Terahertz Wave Generation from Monolayer Graphene Driven by Few-Cycle Laser Pulse

We theoretically investigate the characteristics of terahertz(THz) radiation from monolayer graphene exposed to normal incident few-cycle laser pulses, by numerically solving the extended semiconductor Bloch equations. Our simulations show that the THz spectra in low frequency regions are highly dependent on the carrier envelope phase(CEP) of driving laser pulses. Using an optimal CEP of few-cycle laser pulses, we can obtain broadband strong THz waves, due to the symmetry breaking of the laser-graphene system. Our results also show that the strength of the THz spectra depend on both the intensity and central wavelength of the laser pulses. The intensity dependence of the THz wave can be described by the excitation rate of graphene, while wavelength dependence can be traced back to the band velocity and the population of graphene. We find that a near single-cycle THz pulse can be obtained from graphene driven by a mid-infrared laser pulse.

An improved method for the investigation of high-order harmonic generation from graphene

High-order harmonic generation (HHG) of bulk crystals in strong laser field is typically investigated with semiconductor Bloch equations (SBEs). However, in the length gauge, it suffers from the divergence for the crystals with a zero band gap, such as graphene, using both Bloch- and Houston-states expansion methods. Here, we present a method of solving the SBEs based on time-dependent Bloch basis, which is equivalent to semiconductor Bloch equations in the velocity gauge. Using this method, we investigate the HHG of a single-layer graphene. It is found that our results for population are in good agreement with the other results. For a initial condition py = 0, we find the electrons just move in single valence band or conduction band, which are in accord with classical results. Our simulations on the HHG dependence of polarization of driving laser pulse confirm that 5th, 7th, and 9th harmonic yields increase to the maximal value when laser ellipticity ε ≈ 0.3. What is more, similar to the case of atoms in the laser field, the total strength of 3rd harmonic decrease monotonically with the increase of ε. In addition, we simulate the dependence of HHG on crystallographic orientation with respect to the polarization direction of linear mid-infrared laser pulse, and the results reveal that for higher harmonics, their radiation along with the change of rotation angle θ reflects exactly the sixfold symmetry of graphene. Our method can be further used to investigate the behaviors of other materials having Dirac points (i.e., surface states of topological insulators) in the strong laser fields.

Determination of structure parameters in strong-field ionization models of atoms

The Ammosov–Delone–Krainov(ADK) and Perelomov–Popov–Terent'ev(PPT) ionization models were widely used in strong-field physics and attosecond science due to their many attractive advantages such as simpler analytical formula, less computational demands, and satisfied accuracy of ionization rate. Based on the density-functional theory, we systematically determine accurate structure parameters of 25 atoms, 24 positive ions and 13 negative ions and tabulate for future applications. The wave function with correct asymptotic behavior is obtained by solving the time-independent Schr?dinger equation with B-spline basis sets and the accurate structure parameters are extracted from this wave function in the asymptotic region. The accuracies of structure parameters are carefully examined by comparing the ionization probabilities(or yields) calculated by PPT and ADK models with those of solving the threedimensional time-dependent Schr?dinger equation and the experimental data.