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The breakdown of a Mott-insulator when subjected to intense laser fields is characterized by the formation of doublon-hole pairs. This breakdown is furthermore evidenced by the production of high harmonics that can be experimentally measured. Here, we present an approach for extracting the doublon-hole correlation length of a Mott insulator. The method is based on a dynamical calculation of the Mott insulator’s rate of charge production in response to an applied strong-field laser pulse. We find that coupling the Mott insulator to a metal drastically increases the correlation length, in support of our recent hypothesis [Phys. Rev. B108,144434(2023)2469-995010.1103/PhysRevB.108.144434] that coupling to a metal enhances the charge fluctuations in the insulator. We confirm our conclusions using density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) calculations. The proposed method can be applied to experimentally measured observables, such as differential reflectivity or the high harmonic generation (HHG) spectrum to extract doublon-hole correlation length.

 

Abstract High harmonic generation (HHG) opens a window on the fundamental science of strong-field light-mater interaction and serves as a key building block for attosecond optics and metrology. Resonantly enhanced HHG from hot spots in nanostructures is an attractive route to overcoming the well-known limitations of gases and bulk solids. Here, we demonstrate a nanoscale platform for highly efficient HHG driven by intense mid-infrared laser pulses: an ultra-thin resonant gallium phosphide (GaP) metasurface. The wide bandgap and the lack of inversion symmetry of the GaP crystal enable the generation of even and odd harmonics covering a wide range of photon energies between 1.3 and 3 eV with minimal reabsorption. The resonantly enhanced conversion efficiency facilitates single-shot measurements that avoid material damage and pave the way to study the controllable transition between perturbative and non-perturbative regimes of light-matter interactions at the nanoscale.