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Abstract Topologically protected surface states present rich physics and promising spintronic, optoelectronic, and photonic applications that require a proper understanding of their ultrafast carrier dynamics. Here, we investigate these dynamics in topological insulators (TIs) of the bismuth and antimony chalcogenide family, where we isolate the response of Dirac fermions at the surface from the response of bulk carriers by combining photoexcitation with below-bandgap terahertz (THz) photons and TI samples with varying Fermi level, including one sample with the Fermi level located within the bandgap. We identify distinctly faster relaxation of charge carriers in the topologically protected Dirac surface states (few hundred femtoseconds), compared to bulk carriers (few picoseconds). In agreement with such fast cooling dynamics, we observe THz harmonic generation without any saturation effects for increasing incident fields, unlike graphene which exhibits strong saturation. This opens up promising avenues for increased THz nonlinear conversion efficiencies, and high-bandwidth optoelectronic and spintronic information and communication applications.

At the electron linac for beams with high brilliance and low emittance (ELBE) center for high-power radiation sources, the second version of a superconducting radio-frequency (SRF) photoinjector has been put into operation and has been routinely applied for user operation at the ELBE electron accelerator. SRF guns are suitable for generating a continuous wave electron beam with high average currents and high beam brightness. The SRF gun at ELBE has the goal to generate short electron pulses with bunch charges of 200–300 pC at typical repetition rates of 100 kHz for the production of superradiant, coherent terahertz radiation. The SRF gun includes a 3.5-cell, 1.3-GHz niobium cavity and a superconducting solenoid. A support system with liquid nitrogen (LN_{2}) cooling allows the operation of normal-conducting, high quantum efficiency photocathodes. We present the design and performance of the SRF gun as well as beam measurement results of the operation with Mg photocathodes at an acceleration gradient of 8 MV/m (4 MeV kinetic energy). In the last section, we discuss the SRF gun application for production of coherent terahertz radiation at the ELBE facility.