Abstract We report the experiments on the optical breakdown and filamentation of femtosecond laser pulses propagating in air at a kHz repetition rate and with several hundreds micro-joule-energy. A 10m-long filament and its breakup and merging at the nonlinear focal region produced by modulational instability of femtosecond laser pulses in air are observed. A simple model based on the nonlinear Schr?dinger equation coupled with multiphoton ionization law is presented to explain the several experimental results.
Received: 17 January 2003
Revised: 08 May 2003
Accepted manuscript online:
PACS:
42.60.Lh
(Efficiency, stability, gain, and other operational parameters)
(Self-focussing, channeling, and filamentation in plasmas)
Fund: Project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No 29890210), the National Basic Research Special Foundation (Grant No G1999075200) and Shanghai Foundation of Science & Technology (Grant No 0159nm022).
Cite this article:
Duan Zuo-Liang (段作梁), Chen Jian-Ping (陈建平), Li Ru-Xin (李儒新), Lin Li-Huang (林礼煌), Xu Zhi-Zhan (徐至展) Optical breakdown and filamentation of femtosecond laser pulses propagating in air at a kHz repetition rate 2004 Chinese Physics 13 359
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