Europium diffusion enhancement in lithium niobate by GeV gadolinium ion irradiations

Abstract

Single crystals of lithium niobate (LiNbO3) with y-cut orientation were irradiated at GANIL with 5.17 MeV/amu 155Gd ions at a fluence ranging from 1.5×1011 to 6.0×1011 ions cm−2. After irradiation the samples were implanted with europium ions of 70 keV energy at a fixed fluence of 5×1016 ions cm−2. Both irradiations and implantations were performed at room temperature. Thermal treatments in air, in the range 300–1100 °C, were applied to investigate the influence of the preirradiation damage on the thermal evolution of Eu implanted LiNbO3 crystals. Transmission electron microscopy micrographs exhibit the amorphous track formed by high-energy irradiations. Rutherford backscattering spectrometry results show that these amorphous tracks enhance the europium diffusion in depth of the LiNbO3. A diffusion coefficient and an activation energy were estimated to be about 4.2×10−15 cm2 s−1 and 0.42 eV, respectively.