Advances in Strong-Field and Attosecond Physics

OVERVIEW

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There will be a special issue of Journal of Modern Optics related to this conference. We strongly encourage all participants to submit articles to this issue. For more details see the call for papers.

The recent upsurge of interest in the electronic processes occurring in the extremely strong fields produced by short pulse lasers has many facets: the possibility of generating extremely short (attosecond) pulses approaching the atomic unit of time, the prospect of investigating fundamental many-electron processes directly in the time domain, the information contained in high harmonic generation, manifestations of quantum coherence and entanglement, and so on.  This is a consequence of the fact that the physical mechanisms behind strong-field optical phenomena take place within a fraction of the laser field, which, for experimentally relevant parameters, comprises hundreds of attoseconds.

Many fascinating effects have been seen in simple atomic systems, and attention is now turning towards more complex systems:  molecules, clusters, surfaces, even nanostructures.  The interaction of strong fields with such systems may have a high-impact on several areas, such as physics, chemistry, biology, or even go beyond fundamental science.   Traditionally, however, strong-field laser theory places considerably more emphasis on the external laser field than on an accurate treatment of the targets.  As a direct consequence, experts in this field are currently facing a great challenge, from the conceptual and methodological viewpoints, in order to describe such systems appropriately.  In particular the treatment of collective, multi-electron effects, and of spatially extended systems have raised a great deal of debate. In order to tackle this challenge, it is necessary to bring approaches and tools employed in other research areas, such as quantum chemistry and condensed-matter physics to strong-field laser physics.  Hence, a strong interaction with scientists of such areas is becoming increasingly important.

This workshop aims to bring the leaders of strong-field and attosecond physics, condensed-matter theory and quantum chemistry together to assess where we are with the various theoretical and computational approaches to atomic problems and discuss the best ways to progress to the more complex systems mentioned above.