Ultrashort Pulse - Definition

Definition

The real electric field corresponding to an ultrashort pulse is oscillating at an angular frequency ω₀ corresponding to the central wavelength of the pulse. To facilitate calculations, a complex field E(t) is defined. Formally, it is defined as the analytic signal corresponding to the real field.

The central angular frequency ω₀ is usually explicitly written in the complex field, which may be separated as an intensity function I(t) and a phase function ψ(t):

The expression of the complex electric field in the frequency domain is obtained from the Fourier transform of E(t):

Because of the presence of the term, E(ω) is centered around ω₀, and it is a common practice to refer to E(ω-ω₀) by writing just E(ω), which we will do in the rest of this article.

Just as in the time domain, an intensity and a phase function can be defined in the frequency domain:

The quantity S(ω) is the spectral density (or simply, the spectrum) of the pulse, and φ(ω) is the spectral phase. Example of spectral phase functions include the case where φ(ω) is a constant, in which case the pulse is called a bandwidth-limited pulse, or where φ(ω) is a quadratic function, in which case the pulse is called a chirped pulse because of the presence of an instantaneous frequency sweep. Such a chirp may be acquired as a pulse propagates through materials (like glass) and is due to their dispersion. It results in a temporal broadening of the pulse.

The intensity functions I(t) and S(ω) determine the time duration and spectral bandwidth of the pulse. As stated by the uncertainty principle, their product (sometimes called the time-bandwidth product) has a lower bound. This minimum value depends on the definition used for the duration and on the shape of the pulse. For a given spectrum, the minimum time-bandwidth product, and therefore the shortest pulse, is obtained by a transform-limited pulse, i.e., for a constant spectral phase φ(ω). High values of the time-bandwidth product, on the other hand, indicate a more complex pulse.