Angular dispersion and temporal change of femtosecond pulses from misaligned pulse compressors

A misaligned stretcher or compressor in a chirped pulse amplification laser introduces residual angular dispersion into the beam, resulting in temporal distortion of the pulse. We demonstrate that an imaging spectrograph is capable for measuring the angular dispersion of a laser beam by an accuracy of 0.2 /spl mu/rad/nm. Using this technique, the analytical expressions of residual angular dispersion of misaligned prism and grating compressors are experimentally proved. Temporal degradations of short pulses due to angular dispersion are studied by measuring the temporal stretch of 16-fs pulses, while the issues of contrast deterioration are also discussed. It is proved that the simultaneous measurement of angular dispersion and pulse duration offers the most precise alignment procedure of prismatic and grating compressors.