Laser-induced hole filling: Cresyl Violet in polyvinyl alcohol films

Abstract

Laser-induced hole filling results are reported for the case in which the primary burn frequency, ωB, and the secondary (filling) frequency, ωS, lie in the origin absorption band of Cresyl Violet. Both two-laser and one-laser (with a Fourier-transform spectrometer) experiments were performed. The one-laser experiments permit monitoring of the entire hole spectrum, which consists of the zero-phonon hole at ωB, its companion phonon sideband holes, and the blue-shifted antihole. From the dependence of the filling efficiency on ωB − ωS it is concluded that the dominant mechanism involves electronic excitation of the antihole sites by means of their broad phonon sideband. It is shown that the antihole sites retain at least a partial memory of their preburn configurations.