Toward a terawatt-kilohertz repetition-rate laser

摘要

We present the different problems related to the amplification ofnultrashort pulses at high repetition rate. Phase distortion, gainnnarrowing and thermal effects are studied in detail. We demonstrate, fornthe first time, that thermal effects in ultrashort pulse amplifiers cannbe harnessed and positively exploited in the laser design resulting innthe production of diffraction limited beams. We demonstrate that peaknpowers at the terawatt-level amplification at a kilohertz repetitionnrate is readily conceivable