Structural and optical study on antimony-silicate glasses doped with thulium ions

Abstract

Structural, spectroscopic and thermal properties of SiO2–Al2O3–Sb2O3–Na2O glass system doped with 0.2mol% Tm2O3 have been presented. Synthesis of antimony-silicate glasses with relatively low phonon energy (600cm−1, which implicates a small non-radiative decay rate) was performed by conventional high-temperature melt-quenching methods. The effect of SiO2/Sb2O3 ratio in fabricated Tm3+ doped glass on thermal, structural and luminescence properties was investigated. On the basis of structural investigations decomposition of absorption bands in the infrared FTIR region was performed, thus determining that antimony ions are the only glass-forming ions, setting up the lattice of fabricated glasses. Luminescence band at the wavelength of 1.8μm corresponding to 3F4→3H6 transition in thulium ions was obtained under 795nm laser pumping. It was observed that combination of relatively low phonon energy and greater separation of optically active centers in the fabricated glasses influenced in decreasing the luminescence intensity at 1800nm.