Optical properties of ion beam modified waveguide materials doped with erbium and silver

Abstract

In the first part of this thesis we investigate codoping of erbium-doped waveguide materials with different ions in order to increase the efficiency of erbium-doped optical amplifiers. Codoping with ytterbium can overcome the limitations due to the small absorption cross section of Er3+ in Al2O3 at 980nm. Yb3+ absorbs radiation of that wavelength efficiently and transfers energy to Er3+. In Al2O3 we have measured energy transfer rates of up to 2500s-1. However, in designing erbium/ytterbium codoped amplifiers care has to be taken to optimise the Yb3+ concentration, since its large absorption cross section strongly depletes the 980nm pump in a waveguide. Codoping with europium or cerium increases the transition rate between the second and first excited state of Er3+ in Y2O3. This provides a higher population in the first excited state of erbium in optical amplifiers pumped at 980nm. Due to the specific energy level structure of the ions, the increase of the transition rate is twice as large for europium codoping than for cerium codoping. Codoping Er-doped glass with silver ions largely increases the excitation probability of erbium when excited in the ultraviolet and visible. The excitation spectrum shows that the pump absorption takes place at Ag-related centres. From there the energy is transferred to Er3+. The second part of this thesis is devoted to the study of metallodielectric composites consisting of silver nanocrystals in glass. These composites are fabricated by ion implantation of inert gas ions into Na+?Ag+ ion-exchanged glass. We demonstrate two applications of the optical properties of these materials: (a) integration of the silver nanocrystals in optical waveguides provides long wavelength pass filters, whose cut-off depends on the length of the region containing Ag nanocrystals. (b) The strong variation of the index of refraction of the metallodielectric in the visible region can be used for the formation of diffraction gratings, written directly into the glass by ion irradiation through a suitable mask. We demonstrate diffraction on a sample irradiated through a self-assembled mask of colloidal silica particles.