Curved Plasma Channel Generation Using Ultraintense Airy Beams
Pavel Polynkin,1*
Miroslav Kolesik,1
Jerome V. Moloney,1,2
Georgios A. Siviloglou,3
Demetrios N. Christodoulides3
Plasma channel generation (or filamentation) using ultraintense
laser pulses in dielectric media has a wide spectrum of applications,
ranging from remote sensing to terahertz generation to lightning
control. So far, laser filamentation has been triggered with
the use of ultrafast pulses with axially symmetric spatial beam
profiles, thereby generating straight filaments. We report the
experimental observation of curved plasma channels generated
in air using femtosecond Airy beams. In this unusual propagation
regime, the tightly confined main intensity feature of the axially
nonsymmetric laser beam propagates along a bent trajectory,
leaving a curved plasma channel behind. Secondary channels bifurcate
from the primary bent channel at several locations along the
beam path. The broadband radiation emanating from different
longitudinal sections of the curved filament propagates along
angularly resolved trajectories.
2 Department of Mathematics, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA.
3 Center for Research and Education in Optics and Lasers–College of Optics and Photonics, University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL 32816, USA.
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: ppolynkin{at}optics.arizona.edu
