Physics of attosecond pulses produced via high harmonic generation

The physics of extreme ultraviolet attosecond pulse trains generated during the interaction between an intense laser pulse and a gas medium is presented, including a simple model based on the solution of the classical equations of motion of an electron in an oscillating laser field. The reconstruction of attosecond beating by the interference of a two-photon transition is described and used to determine the pulse duration of the emitted attosecond pulses. This application is the basis of a laboratory practical for a graduate atomic physics course.