Coherent terahertz radiation from indium tin oxide film via third-order optical nonlinearity

Coherent terahertz (THz) wave emission from indium tin oxide (ITO) in epsilon-near-zero region had been reported recently as a second-order nonlinear process. However, THz radiation from ITO through third-order nonlinear process has not been reported yet. Here, we demonstrate coherent THz radiation from an ITO film via four-wave mixing, a third-order nonlinear process, under the excitation of two-color pulsed laser fields. Experimentally, an in-line phase compensator is utilized to synthesize the asymmetric optical fields to induce photocurrent in an ITO film and consequently emit THz waves. Our experimental results show that THz radiation from ITO films can be coherently controlled by the relative phase between the two-color laser fields. Such a THz wave generation process can be attributed to the fast intra-band nonlinearity in the conduction band. Our demonstration reveals that the fast nonlinearity in ITO can be used to generate THz waves and promotes the investigation of ITO in ultrafast photonics.