Characterization of polarization shaped ultraviolet femtosecond laser pulses

pulses in the ultraviolet (UV) with a method termed DFG-XTURTLE. It combines the recently developed technique of tomographic ultrafast retrieval of transverse light E-fields (TURTLE) with the well-established cross-correlation frequency-resolved optical gating (XFROG) amplitude and phase retrieval algorithm. Three individual linear projections at 0 degrees, 45 degrees, and 90 degrees of the vector-shaped field in the UV are frequency mixed with a well-characterized reference field at 800 nm and the generated frequency-resolved difference-frequency cross correlations in the visible are analyzed with a standard XFROG algorithm. The TURTLE search algorithm then establishes the full vector field of the UV pulses by finding the correct phase relationship between the 0 degrees and 90 degrees projections to reconstruct the projection at 45 degrees. To retrieve the interpulse phase of temporally well-separated pulses, additional spectra must be taken. The handedness of shaped pulses can also be assigned with additional measurements. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America