Femtosecond synchronization of a 3 GHz RF oscillator to a mode-locked Ti:sapphire laser

We have synchronized a 3 GHz electronic oscillator to a 75 MHz femtosecond self-mode-locked Ti:sapphire laser with a relative root-mean-square phase-jitter of less than 20 fs in the frequency range of 0.05 Hz-100 kHz and a drift of 20 fs/h. The jitter has been measured by time and frequency domain analysis. Potential applications include synchronization of lasers and RF power sources in particle accelerator experiments and high-resolution pump-probe experiments using, e.g. electrons and lasers. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.