Generation of high photon flux coherent soft x-ray radiation with few-cycle pulses

We present a tabletop source of coherent soft x-ray radiation with high-photon flux. Two-cycle pulses delivered by a fiber-laser-pumped optical parametric chirped-pulse amplifier operating at 180 kHz repetition rate are upconverted via high harmonic generation in neon to photon energies beyond 200 eV. A maximum photon flux of 1.3 . 10(8) photons/s is achieved within a 1% bandwidth at 125 eV photon energy. This corresponds to a conversion efficiency of similar to 10(-9), which can be reached due to a gas jet simultaneously providing a high target density and phase matching. Further scaling potential toward higher photon flux as well as higher photon energies are discussed. (C) 2013 Optical Society of America