Physical disorder and optical properties in the vacuum ultraviolet region of amorphous SiO(2)

Paramagnetic Point Defect in Fluorine-Doped Silica Glass: The E^{'}(F) Center

Fluorine-doped silica is a key material used in all low-loss and/or radiation-resistant optical fibers. Surprisingly, no fluorine-related radiation-induced point defects have been identified. By using electron paramagnetic resonance, we report the first observation of F-related defects in silica. Their fingerprint is a doublet with 10.5 mT splitting due to hyperfine coupling (hfc) to ^{19}F nuclear spins. An additional 44.4 mT hfc to the ^{29}Si nucleus indicates that this defect belongs to the "E^{'} center" family and has a structure of a fluorine-modified Si dangling bond: 3-coordinated Si atoms with an unpaired electron in an sp^{3} orbital, bonded to a glass network by 2 bridging oxygen atoms and to a F atom.

Improved radiation resistance of an Er-doped silica fiber by a preform pretreatment method

We report a novel pretreatment method to improve the radiation resistance of Er-doped fiber (EDF). The processing object of this method is EDF preform, and the pretreatment processing involves three steps: deuterium loading, pre-irradiation, and thermal annealing. The effects of pretreatment conditions on the optical loss, gain performance, and radiation resistance of EDF were systematically studied. The relevant mechanisms were revealed using Fourier transform infrared (FTIR), radiation-induced absorption (RIA), and electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectroscopies. The results show that the pretreatment can not only greatly reduce the hydroxyl content of the EDF core, but it can also effectively improve the radiation resistance of EDF. The online test results show that the gain of the commercial, pristine, and pretreated EDFs were reduced by 19.0, 4.2, and 1.3 dB, respectively, corresponding to a decrease of 68.1, 16.2, and 4.7% after 98 krad X-rays irradiation. The high vacuum experiments show that the pretreatment method can maintain long-term stable high radiation resistance. This work provides a reference for the development of high-performance radiation resistant EDFs for use in the lower, middle, and geosynchronous earth orbit.

Intrinsic Point Defects in Silica for Fiber Optics Applications

Due to its unique properties, amorphous silicon dioxide (a-SiO2) or silica is a key material in many technological fields, such as high-power laser systems, telecommunications, and fiber optics. In recent years, major efforts have been made in the development of highly transparent glasses, able to resist ionizing and non-ionizing radiation. However the widespread application of many silica-based technologies, particularly silica optical fibers, is still limited by the radiation-induced formation of point defects, which decrease their durability and transmission efficiency. Although this aspect has been widely investigated, the optical properties of certain defects and the correlation between their formation dynamics and the structure of the pristine glass remains an open issue. For this reason, it is of paramount importance to gain a deeper understanding of the structure-reactivity relationship in a-SiO2 for the prediction of the optical properties of a glass based on its manufacturing parameters, and the realization of more efficient devices. To this end, we here report on the state of the most important intrinsic point defects in pure silica, with a particular emphasis on their main spectroscopic features, their atomic structure, and the effects of their presence on the transmission properties of optical fibers.

Enhanced medium-range order in vapor-deposited germania glasses at elevated temperatures

Glasses are nonequilibrium solids with properties highly dependent on their method of preparation. In vapor-deposited molecular glasses, structural organization could be readily tuned with deposition rate and substrate temperature. Here, we show that the atomic arrangement of strong network-forming GeO₂ glass is modified at medium range (<2 nm) through vapor deposition at elevated temperatures. Raman spectral signatures distinctively show that the population of six-membered GeO₄ rings increases at elevated substrate temperatures. Deposition near the glass transition temperature is more efficient than postgrowth annealing in modifying atomic structure at medium range. The enhanced medium-range organization correlates with reduction of the room temperature internal friction. Identifying the microscopic origin of room temperature internal friction in amorphous oxides is paramount to design the next-generation interference coatings for mirrors of the end test masses of gravitational wave interferometers, in which the room temperature internal friction is a main source of noise limiting their sensitivity.

Surface molecular structure defects and laser-induced damage threshold of fused silica during a manufacturing process

Laser induced damage of fused silica is a serious problem for high power laser systems, and damage precursors are mainly induced by manufacturing processes. In this work, fused silica samples were prepared from a manufacturing process including grinding, polishing and etching procedures. The chemical disorder of the prepared samples was inspected by using fluorescence microscopy and ultra-violet fluorescence spectrometer. The physical disorder was characterized by using Infrared and Raman spectrometer. Laser induced damage thresholds (LIDTs) were measured in R-on-1 mode by 355 nm 6.4 ns laser pulse. Results showed that with the manufacturing processes transforming from grinding to etching, the magnitude of fluorescence point defects reduced while their types did not change, the Si-O-Si bonds of prepared samples were strained and the strained bonds were mitigated. The LIDTs increased with the reducing of fluorescence defects and strained Si-O-Si bonds. However, these structural defects can not be eliminated by the current manufacturing process. Improvements may be needed to eliminate the structural defects for a higher LIDT of fused silica.

Radiation hardening of sol gel-derived silica fiber preforms through fictive temperature reduction

The impact of fictive temperature (T_f) on the evolution of point defects and optical attenuation in non-doped and Er³⁺-doped sol-gel silica glasses was studied and compared to Suprasil F300 and Infrasil 301 glasses before and after γ-irradiation. To this aim, sol-gel optical fiber preforms have been fabricated by the densification of erbium salt-soaked nanoporous silica xerogels through the polymeric sol-gel technique. These γ-irradiated fiber preforms have been characterized by FTIR, UV-vis-NIR absorption spectroscopy, electron paramagnetic resonance, and photoluminescence measurements. We showed that a decrease in the glass fictive temperature leads to a decrease in the glass disorder and strained bonds. This mainly results in a lower defect generation rate and thus less radiation-induced attenuation in the UV-vis range. Furthermore, it was found that γ-radiation "hardness" is higher in Er³⁺-doped sol-gel silica compared to un-doped sol-gel silica and standard synthetic silica glasses. The present work demonstrates an effective strategy to improve the radiation resistance of optical fiber preforms and glasses through glass fictive temperature reduction.

Luminescence from nearly isolated surface defects in silica nanoparticles

A structured emission/excitation pattern, proper of isolated defects, arises in a vacuum from silica nanoparticles. The luminescence, centered around 3.0-3.5 eV, is characterised by a vibronic progression due to the phonon coupling with two localised modes of frequency  ∼1370 cm(-1) and  ∼360 cm(-1), and decays in about 300 ns at 10 K. On increasing the temperature, the intensity and the lifetime decrease due to the activation of a non-radiative rate from the excited state. Concurrently, the temperature dependence of the lineshape evidences the low coupling with non-localised modes of the matrix (Huang-Rhys factor S ~ 0.2) and the poor influence of the inhomogeneous broadening. These findings outline an uncommon behaviour in the field of the optical properties of defects in amorphous solids, evidencing that the silica surface can allocate luminescent defects almost disentangled from the basal network.

Hydrogen-induced rupture of strained Si─O bonds in amorphous silicon dioxide

Using ab initio modeling we demonstrate that H atoms can break strained Si─O bonds in continuous amorphous silicon dioxide (a-SiO(2)) networks, resulting in a new defect consisting of a threefold-coordinated Si atom with an unpaired electron facing a hydroxyl group, adding to the density of dangling bond defects, such as E' centers. The energy barriers to form this defect from interstitial H atoms range between 0.5 and 1.3 eV. This discovery of unexpected reactivity of atomic hydrogen may have significant implications for our understanding of processes in silica glass and nanoscaled silica, e.g., in porous low-permittivity insulators, and strained variants of a-SiO(2).

1064 nm laser-induced defects in pure SiO₂ fibers

We investigate evidence of the formation of nonbridging oxygen hole centers in pure silica photonic crystal fibers from 5 ps 1064 nm pulses. The formation of the defects is attributed to the breaking of stressed silicon-oxygen bonds in the glass matrix through a many-photon process. We compare the photodarkening induced by the 1064 nm pump with photodarkening induced by short wavelength light in a 1064 nm pumped supercontinuum extending to 400 nm. It is shown that the higher peak power at the pump wavelength makes it a more significant cause of photodarkening when compared to the shorter wavelength light generated in the fiber.

Correlation between propagation loss and silicon dioxide film properties for surface acoustic wave devices

The correlation between the propagation loss and SiO2 film properties has been studied for temperature-compensated SAW devices using the SiO2/LiNbO3 structure. The SAW devices were prepared under different deposition temperatures for SiO2 film. Although they possessed excellent temperature coefficient of elasticity characteristics, devices prepared at lower temperature showed lower Q-factors. The SiO2 films were also deposited on a Si substrate under the same deposition conditions used for the SAW device preparation. Optical characterization was performed with Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), spectrometer measurement, and Raman spectroscopy. IR absorbance spectra were almost same in the FT-IR measurement. However, optical attenuation in the UV region decreased with the deposition temperature in the spectrometer measurement. The optical attenuation is caused by the increase of the extinction coefficient in the SiO2 layer, and its optical wavelength dependence indicated that observed excess attenuation is caused by Rayleigh scattering. The Raman scattering also decreased with the deposition temperature in the Raman spectroscopy. The scattering is caused by the distortion of the SiO2 network. These results indicate that the Rayleigh scattering caused by the distortion of the SiO2 network is the main contributor to the excess SAW propagation loss in this case.

High resolution characterization of modifications in fused silica after exposure to low fluence 355 nm laser at different repetition frequencies

We report on the characterization of modifications in fused silica after exposure to low fluence (2 J/cm2) 355 nm laser at repetition frequencies of 1 Hz, 5 Hz and 10 Hz. Synchrotron based XRF spectroscopy is employed to study concentration variation of metal inclusions in the surface layer. Positron annihilation lifetime spectroscopy is used to probe atomic size defects variation in bulk silica. FT-IR is used to characterize changes of bond length and angle of Si-O-Si covalent bond of irradiated silica. Compared to the basic frequency, the big loss of cerium and iron concentration, the size enlargement of vacancy cluster and the decrease of Si-O-Si covalent bond length after 10 Hz laser irradiation are illustrated by our data. These tiny modifications provide important data to investigate laser damage mechanism.

The structural disorder of a silica network probed by site selective luminescence of the nonbridging oxygen hole centre

We studied the inhomogeneous distribution of the luminescence band associated with the nonbridging oxygen hole centre in silica through site selective excitation/detection of the zero phonon line by a tunable laser source. Defects induced in the bulk of synthetic samples by γ and β exposure exhibit an increase of the inhomogeneous width from 0.071 to 0.086 eV on increasing the irradiation dose from 2 × 10(6) to 5 × 10(9) Gy. We also investigated two defect variants stabilized at the surface of the silica nanoparticles, (≡ Si-O)3 Si–O* and (≡ Si-O)2(H-O)Si-O*, whose inhomogeneous width was measured to be 0.042 eV and 0.060 eV, respectively. These results can be accounted for by the structural disorder around the defect, and specific causes of its variation can be pointed out, such as the network modification induced by irradiation or the structural alteration near the SiO(4) coordination sphere.

Formation of color centers in a soda-lime silicate glass by excimer laser irradiation

We have investigated defect generation in soda-lime silicate and iron-doped soda-lime silicate glasses by excimer laser irradiation in order to apply coloration due to radiation-induced defects as a coloring technique for practical glass products. The laser irradiation generated various kinds of defects, i.e., non-bridging oxygen hole centers (NBOHCs), E' centers, and trapped electron centers, as does x-ray and γ-ray irradiation. The amounts of generated NBOHCs, monitored by the absorption intensity, increased at first with the irradiation time for both the ArF and XeF lasers, and eventually became saturated. The saturated values for the ArF laser irradiation were almost the same regardless of the laser intensity, whereas those for the XeF laser irradiation were dependent on the intensity; a higher intensity generated a larger amount of NBOHCs. From the comparison of the energies of the photon and the absorption edge of the soda-lime silicate glasses, the defect generation reactions were expected to be one-photon and two-photon processes for the ArF and XeF lasers, respectively. In order to explain the defect generation behavior, we used a simple kinetic model in which the NBOHCs are reversibly generated and annihilated through the photo-reaction. The model includes a stretched exponential function, which is often observed for reactions occurring in amorphous materials. The dependences of the amounts of the generated NBOHCs on the irradiation time and intensity of the laser pulses derived from the model were consistent with the experimental results.

Generation of defects in amorphous SiO(2) assisted by two-step absorption on impurity sites

Generation of the Si dangling bond defect in amorphous SiO(2) (E' centre) induced by tunable pulsed UV laser radiation was investigated by in situ optical absorption measurements. The defect generation efficiency peaks when the photon energy equals ∼5.1 eV, it depends quadratically on laser intensity and is correlated with the native linear absorption due to Ge impurities. We propose a model in which the generation of E' is assisted by a two-step absorption process occurring on Ge impurity sites.

Investigation of the writing mechanism of electric-arc-induced long-period fiber gratings

The mechanism for inscription of electric-arc-induced long-period gratings in SMF28 fiber was studied. The refractive-index profiles of irradiated fiber samples were measured, and their structures were investigated by Raman and luminescence spectroscopy. Slight geometrical deformations of the irradiated fiber were measured. A significant change in the Raman spectrum range from 200 to 700 cm(-1) caused by the electric arc is reported. The results show a decrease in the intensity of this band, indicating a modification, such as densification, of the glass structure. No modification of the fictive temperature was measured. A large increase in the red luminescence band was also observed and attests to the creation of defects in the fiber network structure.

First-principles calculation of vibrational Raman spectra in large systems: signature of small rings in crystalline SiO2

We present an approach for the efficient calculation of vibrational Raman intensities in periodic systems within density functional theory. The Raman intensities are computed from the second order derivative of the electronic density matrix with respect to a uniform electric field. In contrast to previous approaches, the computational effort required by our method for the evaluation of the intensities is negligible compared to that required for the calculation of vibrational frequencies. As a first application, we study the signature of 3- and 4-membered rings in the Raman spectra of several polymorphs of SiO2, including a zeolite (H-ZSM-18) having 102 atoms per unit cell.

Diffusion and reactions of hydrogen in F2-laser-irradiated SiO2 glass

The diffusion and reactions of hydrogenous species generated by single-pulsed F2 laser photolysis of SiO-H bond in SiO2 glass were studied in situ between 10 and 330 K. Experimental evidence indicates that atomic hydrogen (H0) becomes mobile even at temperatures as low as approximately 30 K. A sizable number of H0 dimerize by a diffusion-limited reaction into molecular hydrogen (H2) that may migrate above approximately 200 K. Activation energies for the diffusion, inherently scattered due to the structural disorder in glass, are separated into three bands centered at approximately 0.1 eV for free H0, approximately 0.2 eV presumably for shallow-trapped H0, and approximately 0.4 eV for H2.