Light Filaments

Jean-Claude Diels is a professor at the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of New Mexico, USA. He co-authored the book, Lasers: The Power and Precision of Light, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the laser, and the graduate Textbook: Ultrashort Laser Pulse Phenomena. He received the 2006 Engineering Excellence Award of the Optical Society of America. His lab pioneered the field of filamentation in air.Martin C. Richardson is a professor at the College of Optics and Photonics at the University of Central Florida. He has published over 400 scientific articles in professional scientific journals and presented numerous invited and plenary talks. He holds more than 20 patents and has chaired many international conferences, including IQEC, ICHSP, and several SPIE meetings. He is a former Associate Editor of JQE, a recipient of the Schardin Medal, and a Fellow of OSA.Ladan Arissian holds the appointment of physicist at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Boulder, CO, USA. She previously held the position of a Research Associate Professor at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Ottawa in Canada. Her areas of expertise are ultrafast optics, precision spectroscopy, and strong-field physics.

• IntroductionChapter 1: Femtosecond laser filamentation and applicationsChapter 2: UV filamentsChapter 3: Long-wave infrared filamentation in air: lasers and high-field phenomenaChapter 4: Extreme temporal compression of ultra-broadband mid-infrared pulsesChapter 5: Interaction of optical beams in nonlinear mediaChapter 6: Nonlinear processes in coupled light filaments: numerical studiesChapter 7: Filamentation of femtosecond laser pulses under tight focusingChapter 8: Linear and nonlinear exotic light wave packets, physics and applicationsChapter 9: Dimensionless numbers for numerical simulations and scaling of ultrashort laser pulse filamentationChapter 10: Kerr instability amplificationChapter 11: Plasma studies in filamentChapter 12: Filamentation for atmospheric remote sensing and controlChapter 13: Long-range applications of ultrafast laser filaments