Photoburning of Persistent Spectral Holes, and Space-Time Domain Holography of Ultrafast Events of Nano- and Picosecond Duration

Photoburning of persistent spectral holes is not only an effective method to eliminate the inhomogeneous broadening and perform high resolution spectroscopy, but it serves also as a powerful tool to control the absorption coefficient and refractive index of the matter by means of illumination. It opens new horizons for frequency-selective optical memories, holographic data storage and data processing. A short review of the results obtained in the field is presented.