Abstract

There are several techniques for directly measuring the shape of short optical pulses, such as detection with photodiodes and streak cameras. Current state of the ait is 1-2 ps time resolution. We report a new technique to measure the pulse width of a 1.064 µm Nd:YAG mode-locked pulse-train with 3 ps resolution. This technique is best described as time-to-frequency conversion: pulse amplitude is uniquely mapped from die time domain to frequency domain such that the pulse shape can be directly measured with a spectrometer. This work further demonstrates the elegant analogy between diffraction and dispersion¹, and the power of the time-lens description of pulse manipulation² where spatial variables are exchanged with time variables and spatial frequencies with temporal frequencies.

© 1993 Optical Society of America