Abstract
The generation of white-light continuum by femtosecond laser pulses in transparent dielectric materials is investigated with 800-nm pump wavelength and self-phase modulation is the main process to produce the physical phenomenon. Our research is focused on the characterizations of white-light spectra width, polarization, pulse width, and frequency chirping with different materials like water, alcohol, methanol, sapphire, quartz, pyrex glass, calcite etc.For white-light polarization, a self-induced change in polarization of the white-light continuum is observed in trigonal crystal structure. For white-light spectra width, we find that the ratio of the medium’s bandgap energy to the photon energy of the incident wavelength determines the amount of spectrum broadening. After the investigation of polarization, the frequency chirp of the white-light continuum is characterized by the Kerr-gate method with 140 fs temporal and 20 nm wavelength resolution.By the investigation of white-light continuum, we can apply to femtosecond time-resolved luminescence spectroscopy, optical pulse compression for generation of ultrashort pulses etc.