Space-time coupling in the up-conversion of broadband down-converted light

Abstract: We investigate the up-conversion process of broadband light from parametric down-conversion (PDC), focusing on the spatio-temporal spectral properties of the sum-frequency generated (SFG) radiation. We demonstrate that the incoherent component of the SFG spectrum is characterized by a skewed cigar-shaped geometry in space-time due to the compensation of spatial walk-off and group-velocity mismatch between the fundamental and the generated SFG fields. The results are illustrated both by a theoretical modeling of the optical system and by experimental measurements.