High-order harmonic generation by sub-cycle laser pulses and associated scaling laws

Abstract

We studied the high-harmonic generation by the interaction of sub-cycle laser pulses with the He atom. The sub-cycle pulses are modeled using the complex source vector beam model, which is an exact solution to Maxwell's equations and accurately models the sub-cycle field profiles. We observed that the harmonic cutoff could be extended with the variation of the sub-cycle pulse duration, mainly because of the inherent blueshift associated with shorter pulses. The scaling laws for the harmonic yield and harmonic cutoff energy with pulse duration and fundamental driver wavelengths are also deduced. Furthermore, a detailed wavelet analysis of harmonic generation by sub-cycle pulses is carried out. The appropriate filtering and superposition of the harmonics gave rise to a single attosecond pulse of duration ∼100 as.