Powerful supercontinuum vortices generated by femtosecond vortex beams with thin plates

We demonstrate numerically and experimentally the generation of powerful supercontinuum vortices from femtosecond vortex beams by using multiple thin fused silica plates. The supercontinuum vortices are shown to preserve the vortex phase profile of the initial beam for spectral components ranging from 500 nm to 1200 nm. The transfer of the vortex phase profile results from the inhibition of multiple filamentation and the preservation of the vortex ring with relatively uniform intensity distribution by means of the thin-plate scheme, where the supercontinuum is mainly generated from the self-phase modulation and self-steepening effects. Our scheme works for vortex beams with different topological charges, which provides a simple and effective method to generate supercontinuum vortices with high power. (C) 2022 Chinese Laser Press

Automated summary

We demonstrate the generation of powerful supercontinuum vortices from femtosecond vortex beams using multiple thin fused silica plates, both numerically and experimentally. The generated supercontinuum vortices preserve the vortex phase profile of the initial beam within a spectral range of 500 nm to 1200 nm. This is achieved by inhibiting multiple filamentation and maintaining a relatively uniform intensity distribution of the vortex ring through the thin-plate scheme, which primarily relies on self-phase modulation and self-steepening effects. Our method works effectively for vortex beams with different topological charges, providing a simple and efficient approach to generate high-power supercontinuum vortices.