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The strong coupling between intense laser fields and valence electrons in molecules causes a distortion of the potential energy hypersurfaces which determine the motion of nuclei in a molecule and influences possible reaction pathways. The…
Exciting electrons in solids with intense light pulses offers the possibility of generating new states of matter through nonthermal means and controlling their macroscopic properties on femto- to picosecond timescales. One way to manipulate…
The field of laser-matter interaction traditionally deals with the response of atoms, molecules and plasmas to an external light wave. However, the recent sustained technological progress is opening up the possibility of employing intense…
It is predicted that nuclear spin conversion in molecules can be efficiently controlled by strong laser radiation resonant to rovibrational molecular transition. The phenomenon can be used for substantial enrichment of spin isomers, or for…
A mechanism is explored whereby intense laser radiation induces an optical force between the constituent atoms of a molecule. In the case of a diatomic molecule the effect results in a modification of the vibrational potential, and using…
Recently it has been recognized that electronic conical intersections in molecular systems can be induced by laser light even in diatomics. As is known a direct consequence of these accidental degeneracies is the appearence of nonadiabatic…
We show that dressing polar molecules with a far-off-resonant optical field leads to new types of intermolecular potentials, which undergo a crossover from the inverse-power to oscillating behavior depending on the intermolecular distance,…
We consider deflection of polarizable molecules by inhomogeneous optical fields, and analyze the role of molecular orientation and rotation in the scattering process. It is shown that molecular rotation induces spectacular rainbow-like…
Several laser techniques have been suggested and demonstrated recently for preparing polarizable molecules in rapidly spinning states with a disc-like angular distribution. We consider motion of these spinning discs in inhomogeneous fields,…
We experimentally observe the action of multiple light pulses on the transverse motion of a continuous beam of fullerenes. The light potential is generated by non-resonant ultra-short laser pulses in perpendicular spatial overlap with the…
When a detuned and strong laser pulse acts on an optical transition, a Stark shift of the corresponding energies occurs. We analyze how this optical Stark effect can be used to prepare and control the dark exciton occupation in a…
Using a master-equation approach for the description of coherent and incoherent dynamics in `artificial atoms and molecules', we present a theoretical analysis of situations where intense laser fields lead to pronounced renormalizations of…
The extraordinary success in laser cooling, trapping, and coherent manipulation of atoms has energized the efforts in extending this exquisite control to molecules. Not only are molecules ubiquitous in nature, but the control of their…
The propensity of molecules to spatially align along the polarization vector of intense, pulsed light fields is related to readily-accessible parameters (molecular polarizabilities, moment of inertia, peak intensity of the light and its…
Despite numerous achievements and recent progress, nuclear physics is often (wrongly) considered an old field of research nowadays. However, developments in theoretical frameworks and reliable experimental techniques have made the field…
We consider solid surface scattering of molecules that were subject to strong non-resonant ultrashort laser pulses just before hitting the surface. The pulses modify the rotational states of the molecules, causing their field free…
The direct interaction of super-intense laser fields in the optical frequency domain with nuclei is studied. As main observable, we consider the nuclear AC-Stark shift of low-lying nuclear states due to the off-resonant excitation by the…
In recent years it became possible to align molecules in free space using ultrashort laser pulses. Here we explore two schemes for controlling molecule-surface scattering process, which are based on the laser-induced molecular alignment. In…
We propose a method for achieving highly efficient transfer between the vibrational states in a diatomic molecule. The process is mediated by strong laser pulses and can be understood in terms of light-induced potentials. In addition to…
The dynamics of an electron in a strong laser field can be significantly altered by radiation reaction. This usually results in a strongly damped motion, with the electron losing a large fraction of its initial energy. Here we show that the…