Abstract

As progressively shorter optical pulses are being achieved in the laboratory, the question arises: what are the shortest possible pulses and what are their properties? We will describe several families of focused pulse solutions of Maxwell’s equations in vacuum that are either one optical cycle long or one-and-a-half cycles long. Each family of solutions has two adjustable parameters: (1) the optical wavelength and (2) the pulse diameter at focus. These parameters have essentially the same relation to the far-field diffraction angle of the pulse as in the case of a monochromatic gaussian beam. Four of the families of short-pulse solutions we have found constitute a small subset of the four-parameter pulse solutions discovered by Ziolkowski,¹ who called them “modified power spectrum” pulses.

© 1995 Optical Society of America