Efficient selection of a single harmonic emission using a multi-color laser field with an aperture-iris diaphragm

The efficient selection of an almost pure single harmonic emission (the 14th harmonic at 57 nm) from the harmonic comb has been experimentally achieved in an argon gas cell using a multi-color laser field with an aperture-iris diaphragm. When compared with the non-diaphragm case, the purity of the selected single harmonic emission (i.e. the contrast ratio) in the case of using the aperture-iris diaphragm is dramatically increased by approximately order of magnitude. Therefore, the modification of the multi-color laser field by using such an aperture-iris diaphragm before focusing is demonstrated to be an effective way of improving the phase-matching conditions for selective enhancement of the single harmonic emission.