The anharmonic response of charge-density wave (CDW) order to strong laser-pulse perturbations in 1 $T-{\mathrm{TaS}}_2$ and ${\mathrm{TbTe}}_3$ is investigated by means of multiple-pump-pulse time-resolved femtosecond optical spectroscopy. We observe remarkable anharmonic effects hitherto undetected in systems exhibiting collective charge ordering. The efficiency for additional excitation of the amplitude mode by a laser pulse becomes periodically modulated after the mode is strongly excited into a coherently oscillating state. A similar effect is observed also for some other phonons, where the cross-modulation at the amplitude-mode frequency indicates anharmonic interaction of those phonons with the amplitude mode. By analyzing the observed phenomena in the framework of time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau theory we attribute the effects to the anharmonicity of the mode potentials inherent in the broken symmetry state of the CDW systems.

• Received 8 October 2010

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.83.035104