Abstract
We introduce a generalized numerical method to calculate short-pulsed laser propagation in a wide class of multiphoton absorbing materials. The method has no restrictions on the input pulse widths varying from nanosecond to femtosecond, and its numerical solution is both radially and temporarily dependent, enabling us to check numerically the validity of assuming radially constant solutions, which ensures that the true peak intensity falls below the damage causing level. A new feature of our technique enables us to determine quantitatively the contributions to the total absorption due to every electronic energy level. We found excellent agreement between our calculations and experiments using sample materials ranging from reverse saturable absorbers, two-photon absorbers with excited-state absorption to three-photon absorbers. We applied our technique to a two-photon absorber with excited-state absorption and found approximately 1 order of magnitude increase in the absorption when femtosecond pulses were used in place of nanosecond pulses.
© 2006 Optical Society of America
Full Article | PDF ArticleMore Like This
Iam Choon Khoo and Andre Diaz
J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 28(7) 1702-1710 (2011)
Richard L. Sutherland, Mark C. Brant, Jim Heinrichs, Joy E. Rogers, Jonathan E. Slagle, Daniel G. McLean, and Paul A. Fleitz
J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 22(9) 1939-1948 (2005)
Yongwang Gao and Mary J. Potasek
Appl. Opt. 45(11) 2521-2528 (2006)