The generation of ultrashort light pulses is essential for the advancement of attosecond science. Here, we show that attosecond pulses approaching the Fourier limit can be generated through optimized optical driving of tunneling particles in solids. We propose an ansatz for the wave function of tunneling electron-hole pairs based on a rigorous expression for massive Dirac fermions, which enables efficient optimization of the waveform of the driving field. It is revealed that the dynamic sign change in the effective mass due to optical driving is crucial for shortening the pulse duration, which highlights a distinctive property of Bloch electrons that is not present in atomic gases, i.e., the periodic nature of crystals. These results show the potential of utilizing solid materials as a source of attosecond pulses.

• Received 14 March 2023
• Revised 25 August 2023
• Accepted 2 January 2024

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.109.L041303