Gaspard Beaufort

Doctoral project

Advanced Ultrafast Optics for High Harmonic Generation

The research project is mainly articulated around the study of high harmonic generation (HHG).

The experimental investigation of HHG requires state-of-the-art driving light sources. A first part of the work is therefore dedicated to the development of sources of ultrashort, high energy laser pulses in table-top setups. This will involve pushing forward the energy scaling in post-compression setups, using for instance multi-pass cells. This will also include, for example, conversion techniques to access short and energetic pulses in challenging regions of the electromagnetic spectrum.

A second part of the project is focused more theoretically on HHG itself. In particular, since HHG takes place in a gas jet, all atoms contribute to the emission and macroscopic effects have to be taken into account. I will work on simulations and develop simple models to understand phenomena related to these macroscopic effects.