Optical waveform measurement for attosecond science and trace chemical detection

阿秒科学（1秒= 10-18秒），或称阿秒科学，具有解决原子和分子中电子快速运动的独特能力。本提案的主要目的是将这些基于激光的技术扩展到研究液体和固体中电子的运动。这些实验将在光-物质相互作用领域开辟广阔的前沿，即量子和非线性光学、光子学、电学、凝聚态物理和材料科学。此外，原子科学可以与其他高空间分辨率技术相结合，如原子力显微镜（AFM），以解决纳米工程物体（如量子阱，量子点和纳米尖端）中的电子运动。我们提出的对外部电场中的阿秒电子运动具有前所未有的灵敏度的技术，不仅在下一代电子学，电气工程和光子学方面具有潜在的应用，而且在分子检测，距离检测和生物传感方面也有潜在的应用。我的研究小组，温莎大学的阿秒凝聚态实验（ACME）实验室的目标是创造和利用这些阿秒技术，并将它们应用于凝聚态物质，以发现超快过程，控制工程材料中的电子运动，并开发新的光子学技术。在我的实验室里，我们将建模、设计和利用材料中的非线性过程来产生和检测阿秒脉冲。虽然飞秒（1 fs = 10-15 s）激光源在商业上是可用的，但将这些脉冲压缩到阿秒状态是具有挑战性的，但这对原子科学至关重要。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传感器并重建光波形，开发一种具有前所未有分辨率的时间相关红外光谱新工具。对扰动场增加的灵敏度可以与其他已建立的技术相结合，例如原子力显微镜（AFM）在纳米尺度上的阿秒时间分辨率，这是两个不同研究领域前所未有的结合。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，这将对遥感和医学有用。

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.