Abstract

The goal of ‘attosecond dynamic imaging’ is to follow electronic and nuclear dynamics in atoms and molecules with attosecond temporal resolution, with the dream of accomplishing this goal for isolated molecules. Attosecond dynamic imaging also includes the idea of combining attosecond temporal and Angstrom-scale spatial resolution – that is, making movies of electronic and nuclear dynamics in individual molecules. One can try several approaches to realize this dream, and this tutorial will focus on one such route: I will describe the main theoretical and experimental ideas that form the basis of using intense infrared (IR) laser fields for attosecond dynamic imaging, with or without the assistance of attosecond XUV pulses. The key idea in this approach is to remove an electron from the very atom or molecule one wants to image, accelerate it in an intense infrared laser field, and then bring it back to interrogate the parent ion within a fraction of the IR laser cycle. The potential for temporal resolution in this technique comes from the brevity of the electron-parent ion collision, also known as re-collision. The potential for spatial resolution comes from the de-Broglie wavelength of the returning electron.

© 2011 Optical Society of America