Impact of Surface Plasmon Polaritons on Silver Photodiffusion into As2S3 Film

Abstract

The effect of the surface plasmon polariton excitation at the silver–chalcogenide glass interface on the photostimulated diffusion of silver into chalcogenide was studied. The test sample was a two-layer Ag–As2S3 structure deposited on the diffraction gratings with a 899-nm period made using interference photolithography. Photostimulated changes were registered by measuring the kinetics and the angular dependences of the specular reflection of the 632.8-nm wavelength p-polarized light. It was found that the process of photostimulated diffusion of silver into the chalcogenide layer significantly accelerates at its initial stage when the surface plasmon polariton is excited at the Ag–As2S3 interface during irradiation. Thus, it promotes the increase in photosensitivity of the structure—when irradiated at an angle corresponding to the excitation of the plasmon, the entire photodoping process completes much faster.