Generation of sub-17 fs vacuum ultraviolet pulses at 133 nm using cascaded four-wave mixing through filamentation in Ne

The sixth harmonic (6 omega, 133 nm) of a Ti: sapphire laser is generated using cascaded four-wave mixing in filamentation propagation of the fundamental (omega) and the second harmonic (2 omega) pulses through Ne gas. The method provides the 6 omega pulse energy higher than 5 nJ/pulse at 1 kHz and a pulse duration shorter than 17 fs without dispersion compensation. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America