Mid-IR and Terahertz Photonics (141425-SoSe2025)

The lecture starts with a description of the major approaches for mid-infrared (wavelengths of 2-20µm) light generation including fundamentals for each technique. The techniques covered are ion-doped solid-state lasers, fiber lasers, semiconductor lasers, and laser sources based on nonlinear optical frequency conversion. Then we review a range of applications: spectral recognition of molecules and trace gas sensing, biomedical and military applications, high-field physics and attoscience. In the second part of the lecture, longer wavelengths in the so-called Terahertz domain (wavelengths from 20µm up to millimeters) are discussed following a similar structure to the above.