Localized Vector Optical Nondiffracting Subcycle Pulses

Structured light is essential in various fields such as imaging, communications, computing, laser microprocessing, and ultrafast and nonlinear optics. The structuring of light can occur in terms of space, amplitude, phase, polarization, time, frequency, and duration. One of the intriguing properties that can be obtained is resistance to the diffractive spread and dispersive broadening of the pulsed beams. This happens when temporal properties such as frequency are coupled with spatial properties like angles of propagation of plane-wave components. In this case, pulsed light beams exhibit characteristics similar to optical bullets, resisting both diffraction and material dispersion. This study questions whether free-space optical bullets that possess nondiffracting and nondispersive properties are possible with subcycle durations. We report on the possibility to create nondiffracting and nondispersing localized subcycle pulsed beams and their complex polarization topologies when controlling the group velocity of these light structures.