Accelerating and decelerating space-time optical wave packets in free space

Abstract

Although a plethora of techniques are now available for controlling the group velocity of an optical wave packet, there are very few options for creating accelerating or decelerating wave packets whose group velocity varies controllably along the propagation axis. Here we show that `space-time' wave packets in which each wavelength is associated with a prescribed spatial bandwidth enable the realization of optical acceleration and deceleration in free space. Endowing the field with precise spatio-temporal structure leads to group-velocity changes as high as $\sim c$ observed over a distance of $\sim 20$ mm in free space, which represents a boost of at least $\sim 4$ orders of magnitude over X-waves and Airy pulses. The acceleration implemented is in principle independent of the initial group velocity, and we have verified this effect in both the subluminal and superluminal regimes.

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Cited by in corpus (22)

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• Focused fields of ultrashort radially-polarized laser pulses having low-order spatio-temporal couplings
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• Observation of optical de Broglie-Mackinnon wave packets
• Observation of ultrabroadband striped space-time surface plasmon polaritons
• Refraction of space-time wave packets: I. Theoretical principles
• Ultra-Bright Electron Bunch Injection in a Plasma Wakefield Driven by a Superluminal Flying Focus Electron Beam
• Non-Dispersive Space-Time Wave Packets Propagating in Dispersive Media
• Isochronous space-time wave packets
• Non-differentiable angular dispersion as an optical resource
• Relativistic transformations of quasi-monochromatic optical beams
• Refraction of space-time wave packets in a dispersive medium
• Propagation of light in linear and quadratic GRIN media: The Bohm potential
• Transverse spin angular momentum of space-time surface plasmon polariton wave packet
• Charged particle beam transport in a flying focus pulse with orbital angular momentum
• Spectrally recycling space-time wave packets
• Spatiotemporal control of surface plasmon polariton wave packets with nanocavities
• Exciting space-time surface plasmon polaritons by irradiating a nanoslit structure
• Refraction of space-time wave packets: III. Experiments at oblique incidence
• Radiation Reaction Enhancement in Flying Focus Pulses
• Flying focus with arbitrary directionality for spatiotemporal control of laser pulses