Recent improvements in the performance of light sources, i.e. reduction in pulse length and increases in wavelength range and power levels, have led to ultrafast technology becoming a basic tool in a wide variety of scientific fields. This book describes the remarkable technological improvements and results of new applications in the natural sciences and various engineering fields.

Inhalt

I Ultrashort Pulse Generation.- Hybrid and Passive Mode Locking in Coupled-Cavity Lasers.- Generation of Ultrashort Nd:YLF Pulses by cw Passive Mode Locking with a Nonlinear External Cavity.- Ultrashort Pulse Generation with Additive Pulse Modelocking in Solid State Lasers: Ti:Al2O3, Diode Pumped Nd:YAG and Nd:YLF.- Chirp in Actively Modelocked Diode Lasers.- Femtosecond Color Center Lasers near 2.8µm with HgCdTe Multiple Quantum Well Saturable Absorber.- 820nm Colliding-Pulse Modelocked Dye Laser.- Clean Subpicosecond Pulses by Coupling Resonantly to a Linear High Loss Cavity.- Multireflection Effects in Gain-Switched and Q-Switched Semiconductor Lasers.- Dramatic Reduction of the Amplitude Noise of Colliding-Pulse-Modelocking Dye Lasers.- Kilohertz Amplification of Femtosecond Pulses near 1.55 ?m, to Microjoule Energies.- A Broadly Tunable cw Femtosecond Source for Ultrafast Spectroscopy.- Passive Feedback for Stable Short Pulse Generation.- A New Method of Ultrashort Pulse Generation: Modified Fabry-Perot Electrooptic Modulator.- Subpicosecond Argon Pumped Fibre Raman Laser.- Generation and Amplification of Femtosecond Pulses at 800nm.- Femtosecond Laser Cavity Dispersion Measurement Using Soliton Properties.- Physical Properties of Coupled Cavity Lasers Used for Ultrashort Pulse Generation.- Continuous Wave Diode Laser Seeding of Tunable Femtosecond Soliton Pulses.- Gain Compression and Recovery Dynamics in Multiple Quantum Well Optical Amplifiers.- Generation of Blue-Green 10 fs Pulses Using an Excimer-Pumped Dye Amplifier.- Pulse Compression of a Mode-Locked Ti:Sapphire Laser.- Coupled-Cavity Resonant Passive Modelocked (RPM) Ti:Sapphire Laser.- Self-Starting Additive Pulse Mode-Locking of a Nd:Glass Laser.- Soliton-like Pulse Shaping in a cw Passively Mode-Locked Ti:Al2O3 Laser.- Sub-picosecond 38 W Optical Pulses from a Hybrid Mode Locked Semiconductor Laser System.- Femtosecond Generation of Mid Infrared Pulses at 8.5 kHz via Parametric Mixing in AgGaS2.- Femtosecond Pulses in the Medium Infrared by Down-Conversion of a Traveling Wave Dye Laser.- Pulse Evolution in a Coupled-Cavity Mode-Locked KCl:TI Color-Center Laser.- II High Intensity Sources and Interactions.- Ultrahigh Peak Power Generation: Present and Future.- Very High Order Harmonic Generation.- Time-Resolved Spectral Shifts of Femtosecond Pulses in Atmospheric Density Plasmas.- Characterization of a High-Intensity, Subpicosecond XeCl Laser System.- Soft-X-Ray Generation from 100 fs Irradiation of Thin Film Targets.- Ultrafast Microscopy of Exploding Solids.- Femtosecond Melting of Diamond.- Femtosecond Photoemission and Reflectivity Measurements of High Temperature Electron Dynamics in Solid Density Plasmas.- Second Harmonic Generation in Femtosecond Laser-Produced Plasmas.- Enhanced Absorption and ASE Pedestal Suppression in the Generation of Ultrashort-Pulse Solid-Density Plasmas.- Proposed Source of Sub-picosecond Far Infrared Radiation.- III Spectroscopic Techniques and Nonlinear Optics.- Picosecond Stimulated Raman Measurement of Enhanced Optical Nonlinearities in a Conjugated Polymer.- Spontaneous Emission and Ultrafast Dephasing in Front of a Mirror.- Polariton Effects in Transient Grating Experiments.- Atomic Wave Packets and Optical Pulses.- High Time Resolution and Coherence Effects with Incoherent Light in the Raman Fringe Decay.- Fluorescence Detection of Femtosecond Accumulated Photon Echo.- Analysis of Femtosecond Pulse Systems Using Ray-Pulse Matrices.- Picosecond Universal Optical Fluctuation in Strongly Disordered Solids.- Wavepacket Theory of Femtosecond Dynamic Absorption Spectroscopy.- The Anti-Resonant Ring in Ultrafast Excite-Probe Spectroscopy.- Simultaneous Two-Photon Absorption and Second Harmonic Generation in CdSe.- Anomalous Dispersion of the Electronic Kerr Effect n2.- Electronically Programmable Femtosecond Pulse Shaping Using a Multielement Phase Modulator.- Pulsed Diffusing-Wave Spectroscopy: Pathlength Specific Observation of Speckle Fluctuation Spectra from Dense Colloids.- IV Nonlinear Effects in Optical Fibers.- Ultrafast All-Optical Fiber Soliton Logic Gates.- Propagation and Amplification of Ultrashort Optical Soliton Pulses in Erbium-Doped Fibers for Very High Speed Communication.- Observation of Two-Color Soliton Collisions in Optical Fiber.- Modulational Instability for Normal Dispersion.- Ultrafast All-Optical Switching in a Polarization-Maintaining Fiber.- Observation of Induced Phase Modulation of Femtosecond Pulses in Glass and Organic Fibers.- V Optoelectronics.- Optically Induced Femtosecond Electromagnetic Radiation from Semiconductor Surfaces.- Femtosecond Excitonic Sampling in Submicron Thickness Coplanar Striplines.- Picosecond Pulse Generation Circuits Using a GaAs Nonlinear Transmission Line.- Microwave Properties of Anisotropic Materials Characterized with Picosecond Transient Radiation.- Microwave Phase Locking Using an Electro-optic Harmonic Mixer.- Broadband Microwave Reflection Experiments with Picosecond Transient Radiation.- Ultrafast Coplanar Air-Transmission Lines.- VI Quantum Wells; Reduced Dimensionality.- Ultrafast Studies of Resonant and Non-resonant Electron and Hole Tunneling in Quantum Well Structures.- Femtosecond Spectroscopy of Quasi-Zero-Dimensional Magneto-Excitons.- On the Lineshape of Time-Resolved Four-Wave Mixing.- Stimulated Photon Echoes and Free Polarization Decay in GaAs Multiple Quantum Well Structures: Evidence for Localized and Delocalized Excitons.- ?-X Intervalley Electron Transfer Rates in Type-II AlxGa1?xAs/AlAs Superlattices.- Two-Dimensional Carrier-Carrier Screening Studied with Femtosecond Photon Echoes.- Femtosecond Spectroscopy of Highly Excited Cu2O.- Dynamics of Excitons in Conjugated Polymers.- Femtosecond Transient-Grating Experiments in Quantum Wells.- Femtosecond Quantum Beats in Excitons of a Layered Semiconductor Bil3.- Picosecond Photoluminescence of AIGaAs/GaAs Quasi-Quantum Wires and Boxes.- Absorption Saturation Dynamics in Capped CdSe Microcrystallites Exhibiting Quantum Confinement.- Picosecond Imaging of Photoexcited-Carrier Transport in GaAs/AlGaAs Multiple Quantum Wells.- Fast Recovery of Excitonic Absorption Peaks in Tunneling Bi-Quantum-Well Structures.- Degenerate Four Wave Mixing in Staggered Type-II AlxGa1?xAs/AlAs Multiple Quantum Well Structures.- B-Exciton Bleaching in Bulk CdSe.- Femtosecond Room Temperature Measurements of Transport over Nanometer Dimensions in Quantum-Confined Heterostructures.- Femtosecond Nonlinear Optical Properties of GaAs/AlAs Type-II Superlattices.- VII Semiconductors; Solid-State Physics.- Ultrafast Scattering Times in Amorphous Silicon.- k-Space Carrier Dynamics in GaAs.- Time-Resolved Picosecond Photon Echo Studies of Phase Relaxation in CdSSe Mixed Crystals.- Direct Observation of the Electron and Hole Contributions in the Impulse Response of a Metal-Semiconductor-Metal Schottky Diode.- Ultrafast Recombination in Ion-Damaged InP Studied by Femtosecond Luminescence.- Subpicosecond Photoconductivity in III-V Compound Semiconductors Using Low Temperature MBE Growth Techniques.- Nonequilibrium Carrier Dynamics in GaAs Semiconductors Induced by Energetic Ions.- Ultrafast Relaxation Processes of Hot Carriers in Graphite.- Femtosecond Dynamics of Photo-Generated Carriers in Amorphous Hydrogenated Germanium.- Ultrafast Pump-Probe X-Valley Absorption Spectroscopy in GaAs.- Subpicosecond Nonlinearities of Semiconductor Near Infrared Bragg Reflectors.- Femtosecond Thermomodulation of Single-Crystalline and Polycrystalline Gold Films.- Vibrati…