Related papers: Terahertz Kerr effect
Terahertz Kerr-effect (TKE) spectroscopy provides a time-domain optical probe of the intermolecular structural dynamics of liquids, but the measured birefringence can only be interpreted microscopically if transient molecular structure,…
The THz Kerr effect measures the birefringence induced in an otherwise isotropic material by a strong THz pulse driving the Raman-active excitations of the systems. Here we provide experimental evidence of a sizable Kerr response in…
Optically heterodyned detected terahertz Kerr effect of gases of polar molecules is reported. Strikingly, the birefringence signal from fluoroform is found to have opposite polarity compared to water and acetonitrile. This behavior is a…
Formation of local molecular structures in liquid water is believed to have marked effect on the bulk properties of water, however, resolving such structural motives in an experiment is challenging. This challenge might be handled if the…
Microscopic understanding of low-frequency molecular motions in liquids has been a longstanding goal in soft-matter science. So far, such low-frequency motions have mostly been accessed indirectly by off-resonant optical pulses. A more…
The influence of quantum fluctuations of the electromagnetic field on the propagation of a polarized light wave in a nonlinear dielectric is investigated. It is shown that in some cases, the fluctuations couple to the optical nonlinearities…
The well-known Kerr effect in isotropic fluids consists in the appearance of uniaxial orientational order and birefringence that grows as the square of the applied electric field. We predict and observe that at a high electric field, the…
We have observed short-lived optical birefringence in a CH$_3$NH$_3$PbBr$_3$ single crystal induced by a powerful nearly single-cycle terahertz pulse. Apart from the instantaneous contribution that follows the profile of the squared pump…
We report the observation of the electro-optic effect in Bi$_2$Se$_3$ crystals induced by an intense single-cycle terahertz pulse. The effect reveals itself as a transient change of the polarization state of a femtosecond laser pulse…
We investigate the optical response induced by a d.c. current flowing in a nonmagnetic material that lacks inversion symmetry. In this class of materials, the flowing current experiences a nonlinear Hall effect and induces a nonequilibrium…
Nonlinear responses to intense terahertz (THz) fields provide unique insights into complex dynamics of contemporary material systems. However, the interpretation of the obtained data, in particular, distinguishing genuine ionic oscillations…
The angular dependence of terahertz (THz) emission from birefringent crystals can differ significantly from that of cubic crystals. Here we consider optical rectification in uniaxial birefringent materials, such as chalcopyrite crystals.…
The exact quantum time-dependent optical response of hydrogen under strong field near infrared excitation is investigated and compared to the perturbative model widely used for describing the effective atomic polarization induced by intense…
Liquid water at ambient temperature displays ultrafast molecular motions and concomitant fluctuations of very strong electric fields originating from the dipolar H2O molecules. We show that such random intermolecular fields induce tunnel…
In this letter, we investigate the terahertz (THz) electro-optic Kerr effect (KE) dynamics in LaAlO3 (LAO), a widely used substrate for thin film preparation. We show that the KE dynamics strongly depend on the material anisotropy due to…
Dynamic Kerr effect measurements provide a simple realization of a nonlinear experiment. We propose a field-off experiment where an electric field of one or several sinusoidal cycles is applied to a sample in thermal equilibrium.…
Optically induced ultrafast switching of single photons is demonstrated by rotating the photon polarization via the Kerr effect in a commercially available single mode fiber. A switching efficiency of 97\% is achieved with a $\sim1.7$\,ps…
We measure the polarization change of a beam reflected from the surface of both crystalline alpha and amorphous SiO2 samples while they are photo-excited by an intense light pulse, at intensities above the nonlinear excitation threshold yet…
We report the first coherent excitation of intramolecular vibrational modes via the nonlinear interaction of a TeraHertz (THz) light field with molecular liquids. A terahertz-terahertz-Raman pulse sequence prepares the coherences with a…
Controlling light polarization is one of the most essential routines in modern optical technology. Since the demonstration of optical pulse shaping by spatial light modulators and its potential in controlling the quantum reaction pathways,…