Photonic Applications of Tellurite Glasses

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Tellurite glasses have been studied since the 1990s, when researchers found that these materials could have great potential for applications in the field of photonics, due to properties such as high rates of linear and nonlinear refraction, medium-frequency phonons, high solubility to ions of rare earths and low melting points. E. Vogel from Bell Labs first demonstrated applications of these glasses in the form of fiber as optical amplifiers achieving high gain using the rare earths Erbium and praseodymium. Later, Oishi from NTT (Japan), demonstrated fiber amplifiers and amplifiers with high gain. Applications in the field of photonics achieved breakthroughs combining Oishi’s work with mixed microstructured optical fiber tellurite glasses as supercontinuum fiber devices. Microstructured optical fibers such as glass quantum communication devices were demonstrated. Micro lenses for applications in telecommunications and medicine for endoscopy were also developed. Amplifiers in the 1550 nm range have been manufactured by the ion exchange method for use with both planar and channel lasers.