Pulse compression over a 170-THz bandwidth in the visible by use of only chirped mirrors

We report on double-chirped mirrors with custom-tailored dispersion characteristics over a bandwidth of 170  THz in the visible. The mirrors are used in a prismless compressor for a noncollinear optical parametric amplifier in the visible. The compressed pulses, characterized for the what is believed to be first time by use of the spectral phase interferometry for direct electric field reconstruction technique, display a nearly flat phase from 510 to 710  nm and have a duration of 5.7  fs.