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The demonstration of optical guiding of high-intensity laser pulses in a plasma fiber waveguide ͓C. G. Durfee III and H. M. Milchberg, Phys. Rev. Lett. 71, 2409 ͑1993͔͒ has opened the way to new advances in the development of nonlinear optics-based short-wavelength light sources, soft x-ray lasers, and compact laser-driven charged particle accelerators, and offers a new practical realm in which to study, control, and apply nonperturbative laser-matter interactions at ultrahigh intensity. An overview of selected experimental and theoretical results and their applications is presented.

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The quasibound modes of an evolving plasma waveguide were investigated by using variably delayed end-injected and side-injected probe pulses. The use of these different coupling geometries allowed the probing of the waveguide's optical modes during two temporal regimes: early-time plasma channel development, characterized by leaky optical confinement, and later channel hydrodynamic expansion characterized by stronger confinement. The wave equation was solved to determine the available quasiguided optical modes and their confinement for experimentally measured electron density profiles. The guided intensity patterns and spectra measured at the waveguide exit were successfully explained in terms of these mode solutions. The spectrum of broadband end-coupled probe pulses was found to be unaffected by the guiding process, mainly because those modes which survived to the waveguide exit were well-bound, and for strongly bound fields, the transverse mode profiles are wavelength independent. By contrast, side coupling to the quasibound modes of the plasma waveguide was seen to be highly mode and frequency selective.