Tailoring octave-spanning ultrashort laser pulses using multiple prisms

We demonstrate a novel pulse shaper in which an incident laser beam is angularly dispersed by a first prism, and then it is split into separate beams using multiple prisms. Since this new pulse shaper offers independent control of the amplitude and phase of the separate beams, it can produce pulses having desired temporal shapes. Furthermore, it imposes a significant amount of negative group delay dispersion (GDD) over an octave spectrum near visible, which can compensate for a positive GDD accumulated in the process of spectral broadening. Consequently, single-cycle or few-cycle laser pulses can be produced without the need for chirped mirrors.