On the generality of measuring ultrabroad-band ultrashort laser pulses with the d-scan technique using ensembles of dielectric nano- and microparticles

Abstract

We demonstrate that temporal characterization of ultrabroadband laser pulses (∼ 7 fs) through the d-scan technique can be implemented using ensembles of SHG micro and/or nanocrystals independently of their crystal size and/or composition. The experimental results have been supported by numerical simulations based on the Finite-Difference-Time-Domain (FDTD) algorithm. Both, experiment and simulations show that, in spite of the low optical quality of the samples and the unavoidable appearance of incoherent light, the technique is robust and allows to measure ultrashort laser pulses using clusters of randomly distributed and piled-up polar micro- and nanocrystals.