Second Optical Harmonic Generation from Interfaces of Isotropic Materials in Strong Terahertz Field: Surface vs Bulk Contributions

Second optical harmonic generation by nonlinear interaction of femtosecond laser and terahertz pulses in a slab of fused quartz was investigated. It was shown that the second harmonic signal rises only near the slab surfaces and not from the bulk of the fused quartz. The theory of THz induced second optical harmonic in transparent material including dispersion of the optical radiation as well as velocity mismatch of THz and optical pulse was developed. The theory agrees well with experiment.