Optical waveform measurement for attosecond science and trace chemical detection

阿秒科学（1 as = 10-18 s），或阿秒科学，是唯一能够解决原子和分子中电子的快速运动。这项提议的主要目的是将这些基于激光的技术扩展到研究电子在液体和固体中的运动。这些实验将对开辟光-物质相互作用的巨大前沿产生重大影响，即量子和非线性光学、光子学、电光学、凝聚态物理学和材料科学。此外，attoscience可以与其他高空间分辨率技术相结合，如原子力显微镜（AFM），以解决电子在纳米工程物体，如量子威尔斯，量子点和纳米尖端的运动。我们提出的技术，具有前所未有的灵敏度阿秒电子运动在外部电场不仅对下一代电子，电气工程和光子学，而且对分子检测，对峙检测和生物传感的潜在应用。我的研究小组，温莎大学的阿秒凝聚态实验（ACME）实验室的目标是创建和利用这些阿秒技术，并将其应用于凝聚态，以发现超快过程，控制工程材料中的电子运动，并开发新的光子技术。在我的实验室，我们将建模，工程师，并利用非线性过程的材料阿秒脉冲的产生和检测。虽然飞秒（1 fs = 10-15 s）激光源是商业上可用的，压缩这些脉冲到阿秒制度是具有挑战性的，但对于阿托科学是必不可少的。我们将在我的小组中研究和开发这些阿秒脉冲源。通过几个光周期的强场激光脉冲，我们将驱动电流并跟踪电子状态以跟踪电子动力学。此外，我们将利用这些高度非线性过程对扰动场的敏感性作为光场的传感器，并重建光学波形，开发一种具有前所未有的分辨率的时间依赖性红外光谱的新工具。对扰动场的灵敏度增加可以与其他已建立的技术一起利用，例如原子力显微镜（AFM）在纳米级上的阿秒时间分辨率，这是两个不同研究领域的前所未有的组合。此外，通过这项技术，我们将开发一种增强的红外光谱测量，其中分子振动特征可以区分生物样品，这将有助于遥感和医学。

Attosecond science (1 as = 10-18 s), or attoscience, is uniquely capable of resolving the rapid motion of electrons in atoms and molecules. The principal aim of this proposal is to extend these laser-based techniques to study the motion of electrons in liquids and solids. These experiments will have a major impact in opening up a large frontier in light-matter interactions, namely quantum and nonlinear optics, photonics, electro-optics, condensed matter physics, and materials science. In addition, attoscience can be combined with other high spatial resolution techniques, such as atomic force microscopy (AFM), to resolve the motion of electrons in nano-engineered objects such as quantum wells, quantum dots, and nanotips. Our proposed technologies that have unprecedented sensitivity to attosecond electronic motion in external electric fields have potential applications not only for next-generation electronics, electrical engineering, and photonics, but also for molecular detection, standoff detection, and biosensing. The goal of my research group, the Attosecond Condensed Matter Experiments (ACME) laboratory at the University of Windsor, is to create and leverage these attosecond techniques and apply them to condensed matter to discover ultrafast processes, control electronic motion in engineered material, and develop new photonics technologies. In my lab, we will model, engineer, and exploit nonlinear processes in materials for attosecond pulse generation and detection. Although femtosecond (1 fs = 10-15 s) laser sources are commercially available, compressing these pulses to the attosecond regime is challenging, but essential for attoscience. We will investigate and develop these attosecond pulse sources in my group. Through strong-field laser pulses of just a few optical cycles, we will drive currents and follow electronic states to track electron dynamics. Furthermore, we will take advantage of the sensitivity of these highly nonlinear processes to perturbing fields as sensors for optical fields and to reconstruct optical waveforms, developing a novel tool for time-dependent infrared spectroscopy with unprecedented resolution. The increased sensitivity to perturbing fields can be leveraged with other established techniques such as atomic force microscopy (AFM) for attosecond time resolution at the nanoscale, an unprecedented combination of two disparate areas of research. Moreover, through this technique we will develop an enhanced spectroscopic measurement in the infrared, where molecular vibrational signatures can distinguish biological samples, which will be useful for remote sensing and medicine.