Chirped-pulse Raman amplification for two-color, high-intensity laser experiments

We report generation of millijoule-level Stokes (873, 961 nm) and anti-Stokes (738, 685, 639 nm) sidebands of 800 nm terawatt pulses by inserting a multistage Ba(NO3)(2) Raman shifter-amplifier into a conventional Ti:sapphire chirped-pulse amplification system. The Raman subsystem requires no additional pump lasers and does not compromise the energy, duration, or beam quality of the main 800 nm pulses. The chirped first Stokes (870 nm) beam is compressed to transform limit (similar to 100 fs) with several millijoules of energy and has high beam quality and is free of filamentation. Synchronized 800 nm and Raman sideband pulses are useful for a variety of two-color, high-intensity laser experiments. (C) 2008 Optical Society of America.