Femtosecond time-resolved thermomodulation of thin gold films with different crystal structures

Recent Development of Ultrafast Optical Characterizations for Quantum Materials

The advent of intense ultrashort optical pulses spanning a frequency range from terahertz to the visible has opened a new era in the experimental investigation and manipulation of quantum materials. The generation of strong optical field in an ultrashort time scale enables the steering of quantum materials nonadiabatically, inducing novel phenomenon or creating new phases which may not have an equilibrium counterpart. Ultrafast time-resolved optical techniques have provided rich information and played an important role in characterization of the nonequilibrium and nonlinear properties of solid systems. Here, some of the recent progress of ultrafast optical techniques and their applications to the detection and manipulation of physical properties in selected quantum materials are reviewed. Specifically, the new development in the detection of the Higgs mode and photoinduced nonequilibrium response in the study of superconductors by time-resolved terahertz spectroscopy are discussed.

Tracking the Time Evolution of the Electron Distribution Function in Copper by Femtosecond Broadband Optical Spectroscopy

Multitemperature models are nowadays often used to quantify the ultrafast electron-phonon (boson) relaxations and coupling strengths in advanced quantum solids. To test their applicability and limitations, we perform systematic studies of carrier relaxation dynamics in copper, a prototype system for which the two-temperature model (TTM) was initially considered. Using broadband time-resolved optical spectroscopy, we study the time evolution of the electron distribution function, f(E), over a large range of excitation densities. Following intraband optical excitation, f(E) is found to be athermal over several 100 fs, with a substantial part of the absorbed energy already being transferred to the lattice. We show, however, that the electron-phonon coupling constant can still be obtained using the TTM analysis, provided that the data are analyzed over the time window where the electrons are already quasithermal, and the electronic temperature is determined experimentally.

Hot-Electron-Mediated Ion Diffusion in Semiconductors for Ion-Beam Nanostructuring

Ion-beam-based techniques are widely utilized to synthesize, modify, and characterize materials at the nanoscale, with applications from the semiconductor industry to medicine. Interactions of the beam with the target are fundamentally interesting, as they trigger multilength and time-scale processes that need to be quantitatively understood to achieve nanoscale precision. Here we demonstrate for magnesium oxide, as a testbed semiconductor material, that in a kinetic-energy regime in which electronic effects are usually neglected, a proton beam efficiently excites oxygen-vacancy-related electrons. We quantitatively describe the excited-electron distribution and the emerging ion dynamics using first-principles techniques. Contrary to the common picture of charging the defect, we discover that most of the excited electrons remain locally near the oxygen vacancy. Using these results, we bridge time scales from ultrafast electron dynamics directly after impact to ion diffusion over migration barriers in semiconductors and discover a diffusion mechanism that is mediated by hot electrons. Our quantitative simulations predict that this mechanism strongly depends on the projectile-ion velocity, suggesting the possibility of using it for precise sample manipulation via nanoscale diffusion enhancement in semiconductors with a deep, neutral, intrinsic defect.

Plasmonic pulse shaping and velocity control via photoexcitation of electrons in a gold film

We study the possibility of surface plasmon polariton (SPP) pulse shape, delay and duration manipulation on sub-picosecond timescales via a high intensity pump SPP pulse photoexciting electrons in a gold film. We present a theoretical model describing this process and show that the pump induces the phase modulation of the probe pulse leading to its compression by about 20% and the variation of the delay between two SPP pulses up to 15 fs for the incident fluence of the pump of 1.5 mJ∙cm⁻².

Electron-ion equilibration in ultrafast heated graphite

We have employed fast electrons produced by intense laser illumination to isochorically heat thermal electrons in solid density carbon to temperatures of ∼10,000  K. Using time-resolved x-ray diffraction, the temperature evolution of the lattice ions is obtained through the Debye-Waller effect, and this directly relates to the electron-ion equilibration rate. This is shown to be considerably lower than predicted from ideal plasma models. We attribute this to strong ion coupling screening the electron-ion interaction.

Broadband dielectric function of nonequilibrium warm dense gold

We report on the first single-state measurement of the broadband (450-800 nm) dielectric function of gold isochorically heated by a femtosecond laser pulse to energy densities of 10(6) - 10(7) J/kg. A Drude and an interband component are clearly seen in the imaginary part of the dielectric function. The Drude component increases with energy density while the interband component shows both enhancement and redshift. This is in strong disagreement with predictions of a recent calculation of dielectric function based on limited Brillouin zone sampling.

Optimization of a femtosecond ellipsometer for gold photoreflectance studies

I develop a quantitative optimization procedure for femtosecond reflectance ellipsometer measurements. The femtosecond ellipsometer eliminates the need for separate thin-film reflectance and transmittance measurements and allows self-consistent determination of dielectric index changes of optically thick films on arbitrary substrates. I verify the optimization procedure and use the femtosecond ellipsometric measurements to investigate the photoreflectance of an optically thick gold film. A comparison of the extracted real and imaginary dielectric function components reveals evidence of thermalized and nonthermalized hot-electron populations.