Sub-2-cycle terawatt pulses via double-stage multipass cell compression of a Yb laser.

Authors

Victor Koltalo, Jaismeen Kaur, Louis Daniault, Antoine Cavagna, Mickaël Allemand, Florent Pallas, Antoine Courjaud, Emilien Gontier, Cédric Sire, François Sylla, Rodrigo Lopez-Martens

Published in

Optics letters. Volume 51. Issue 22. Pages 6307-6310. Nov 15, 2026. Epub Oct 28, 2026.

Abstract

We report a terawatt-class, sub-2-cycle postcompressed Yb-based laser system operating at a kHz repetition rate. 18 mJ, 500 fs pulses delivered at 1 kHz by a commercial Yb:YAG laser are spectrally broadened and temporally compressed in a double-stage multipass cell setup featuring an argon-filled Herriott-type cell followed by a helium-filled array-type cell, achieving an overall compression factor of 80. The resulting compressed pulses are measured to have 6.2 fs duration (1.8 optical cycles at 1030 nm) and 12.5 mJ energy, corresponding to 1.4 TW effective peak power. To the best of our knowledge, this constitutes the highest peak power reported to date for a few-cycle, kHz-repetition-rate, postcompressed Yb laser system. Focused intensity measurements yield a normalized vector potential of a₀ = 3.0, confirming the applicability of this light source for laser wakefield acceleration.

PMID:
43024451
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 14 Nov 2026.

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