Abstract

A femtosecond or even a picosecond laser pulse may undergo dramatic temporal reshaping or distortion after reflection from a simple linear interface, provided that the angle of incidence is close to Brewster’s angle. The dependence of the reshaping on the properties of the reflector and of the incident pulse is investigated numerically for a material having a dielectric function exhibiting a resonance that could be that of the GaAs exciton. The practical implications of these results are also discussed.

© 1988 Optical Society of America

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