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Nano-Structured Optical Fibers Made of Glass-Ceramics, and Phase Separated and Metallic Particle-Containing Glasses. FIBERS 2019. [DOI: 10.3390/fib7120105] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/21/2022]
Abstract
For years, scientists have been looking for different techniques to make glasses perfect: fully amorphous and ideally homogeneous. Meanwhile, recent advances in the development of particle-containing glasses (PCG), defined in this paper as glass-ceramics, glasses doped with metallic nanoparticles, and phase-separated glasses show that these “imperfect” glasses can result in better optical materials if particles of desired chemistry, size, and shape are present in the glass. It has been shown that PCGs can be used for the fabrication of nanostructured fibers—a novel class of media for fiber optics. These unique optical fibers are able to outperform their traditional glass counterparts in terms of available emission spectral range, quantum efficiency, non-linear properties, fabricated sensors sensitivity, and other parameters. Being rather special, nanostructured fibers require new, unconventional solutions on the materials used, fabrication, and characterization techniques, limiting the use of these novel materials. This work overviews practical aspects and progress in the fabrication and characterization methods of the particle-containing glasses with particular attention to nanostructured fibers made of these materials. A review of the recent achievements shows that current technologies allow producing high-optical quality PCG-fibers of different types, and the unique optical properties of these nanostructured fibers make them prospective for applications in lasers, optical communications, medicine, lighting, and other areas of science and industry.
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Gorni G, Velázquez JJ, Kochanowicz M, Dorosz D, Balda R, Fernández J, Durán A, Pascual MJ. Tunable upconversion emission in NaLuF 4-glass-ceramic fibers doped with Er 3+ and Yb 3. RSC Adv 2019; 9:31699-31707. [PMID: 35527946 PMCID: PMC9072642 DOI: 10.1039/c9ra05182a] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/08/2019] [Accepted: 09/25/2019] [Indexed: 12/01/2022] Open
Abstract
Novel glass-ceramic optical fibers containing NaLuF4 nanocrystals doped with 0.5ErF3 and 2YbF3 (mol%) have been prepared by the rod-in-tube method and controlled crystallization. NaLuF4 nanocrystals with a size around 20 nm are obtained after heat treatment at 600 °C. Intense upconverted green and red emissions due to (2H11/2, 4S3/2) → 4I15/2 and 4F9/2 → 4I15/2 transitions, respectively, together with a blue emission due to 2H9/2 → 4I15/2 transition have been observed under excitation at 980 nm. The intensity of the green and red upconversion bands shows a nearly linear dependence on the excitation power which can be explained by saturation effects in the intermediate energy states and proves that a sensitized energy transfer upconversion process is responsible for the population of the emitting levels of Er3+ ions. The upconversion emission color changes from yellow to green by increasing the excitation power density which allows to manipulate the color output of the Er3+ emission in the glass-ceramic fibers. The tunable emission color is easily detected with the naked eye. This interesting characteristic makes these glass-ceramic fibers promising materials for photonic applications.
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Affiliation(s)
- G Gorni
- Ceramics and Glass Institute, CSIC Madrid Spain
| | - Jose J Velázquez
- FunGlass-Centre for Functional and Surface Functionalized Glass, Alexander Dubček University of Trenčín Trenčín Slovakia
| | - M Kochanowicz
- Bialystok University of Technology, Faculty of Electrical Engineering Bialystok Poland
| | - D Dorosz
- AGH University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Materials Science and Ceramics Krakow Poland
| | - R Balda
- Applied Physic Department I, Superior School of Engineering, Basque Country University Bilbao Spain
- Materials Physics Center CSIC-UPV/EHU San Sebastian Spain
| | - J Fernández
- Donostia International Physics Center San Sebastian Spain
| | - A Durán
- Ceramics and Glass Institute, CSIC Madrid Spain
| | - M J Pascual
- Ceramics and Glass Institute, CSIC Madrid Spain
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Gorni G, Velázquez JJ, Mosa J, Mather GC, Serrano A, Vila M, Castro GR, Bravo D, Balda R, Fernández J, Durán A, Castro Y. Transparent Sol-Gel Oxyfluoride Glass-Ceramics with High Crystalline Fraction and Study of RE Incorporation. NANOMATERIALS 2019; 9:nano9040530. [PMID: 30987125 PMCID: PMC6523291 DOI: 10.3390/nano9040530] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/28/2019] [Revised: 03/20/2019] [Accepted: 03/26/2019] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
Transparent oxyfluoride glass-ceramic films and self-supported layers with composition 80SiO2-20LaF3 doped with Er3+ have been successfully synthesized by sol-gel process for the first time. Crack-free films and self-supported layer with a maximum thickness up to 1.4 µm were obtained after heat treatment at the low temperature of 550 °C for 1 min, resulting in a LaF3 crystal fraction of 18 wt%, as confirmed by quantitative Rietveld refinement. This is the highest value reported up to now for transparent oxyfluoride glass-ceramics prepared by sol-gel. This work provides a new synthesis strategy and opens the way to a wide range of potential applications of oxyfluoride glass-ceramics. The characterization by a wide range of techniques revealed the homogeneous precipitation of LaF3 nanocrystals into the glass matrix. X-ray absorption spectroscopy and electron paramagnetic resonance confirmed that the Er3+ ions are preferentially embedded in the low phonon-energy LaF3 nanocrystals. Moreover, photoluminescence (PL) measurements confirmed the incorporation of dopants in the LaF3 nanocrystals. The effective concentration of rare-earth ions in the LaF3 nanocrystals is also estimated by X-ray absorption spectroscopy.
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Affiliation(s)
- Giulio Gorni
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio, CSIC, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
| | - Jose J Velázquez
- FunGlass-Centre for Functional and Surface Functionalized Glass, Alexander Dubček University of Trenčín, Trenčín 91150, Slovakia.
| | - Jadra Mosa
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio, CSIC, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
| | - Glenn C Mather
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio, CSIC, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
| | - Aida Serrano
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio, CSIC, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
- SpLine, Spanish CRG Beamline-European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF), 38043 Grenoble, France.
| | - María Vila
- SpLine, Spanish CRG Beamline-European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF), 38043 Grenoble, France.
- Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales de Madrid, CSIC, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
| | - Germán R Castro
- SpLine, Spanish CRG Beamline-European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF), 38043 Grenoble, France.
- Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales de Madrid, CSIC, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
| | - David Bravo
- Departamento Física de Materiales, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (UAM), 28049 Madrid, Spain.
| | - Rolindes Balda
- Departamento Física Aplica I, Escuela Superior de Ingeniería, Universidad del País Vasco (UPV-EHU), 48013 Bilbao, Spain.
- Centro de Física de Materiales, (UPV/EHU-CSIC), 20018 San Sebastian, Spain.
| | - Joaquín Fernández
- Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC), 20018 San Sebastian, Spain.
| | - Alicia Durán
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio, CSIC, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
| | - Yolanda Castro
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio, CSIC, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
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Transparent Glass-Ceramics Produced by Sol-Gel: A Suitable Alternative for Photonic Materials. MATERIALS 2018; 11:ma11020212. [PMID: 29385706 PMCID: PMC5848909 DOI: 10.3390/ma11020212] [Citation(s) in RCA: 31] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/11/2018] [Revised: 01/26/2018] [Accepted: 01/27/2018] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
Transparent glass-ceramics have shown interesting optical properties for several photonic applications. In particular, compositions based on oxide glass matrices with fluoride crystals embedded inside, known as oxyfluoride glass-ceramics, have gained increasing interest in the last few decades. Melt-quenching is still the most used method to prepare these materials but sol-gel has been indicated as a suitable alternative. Many papers have been published since the end of the 1990s, when these materials were prepared by sol-gel for the first time, thus a review of the achievements obtained so far is necessary. In the first part of this paper, a review of transparent sol-gel glass-ceramics is made focusing mainly on oxyfluoride compositions. Many interesting optical results have been obtained but very little innovation of synthesis and processing is found with respect to pioneering papers published 20 years ago. In the second part we describe the improvements in synthesis and processing obtained by the authors during the last five years. The main achievements are the preparation of oxyfluoride glass-ceramics with a much higher fluoride crystal fraction, at least double that reported up to now, and the first synthesis of NaGdF4 glass-ceramics. Moreover, a new SiO2 precursor was introduced in the synthesis, allowing for a reduction in the treatment temperature and favoring hydroxyl group removal. Interesting optical properties demonstrated the incorporation of dopant ions in the fluoride crystals, thus obtaining crystal-like spectra along with higher efficiencies with respect to xerogels, and hence demonstrating that these materials are a suitable alternative for photonic applications.
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Cabral AA, Balda R, Fernández J, Gorni G, Velázquez JJ, Pascual L, Durán A, Pascual MJ. Phase evolution of KLaF4 nanocrystals and their effects on the photoluminescence of Nd3+ doped transparent oxyfluoride glass-ceramics. CrystEngComm 2018. [DOI: 10.1039/c8ce00897c] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/21/2022]
Abstract
Quantity of cubic (α-phase) and hexagonal (β-phase) KLaF4 nanocrystals (NCs) tailored by doping.
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Affiliation(s)
- A. A. Cabral
- Departamento de Física
- Instituto Federal do Maranhão – IFMA
- São Luis
- Brazil
| | - R. Balda
- Departamento de Física Aplicada I
- Escuela Superior de Ingeniería
- Universidad del País Vasco UPV-EHU
- Bilbao
- Spain
| | - J. Fernández
- Departamento de Física Aplicada I
- Escuela Superior de Ingeniería
- Universidad del País Vasco UPV-EHU
- Bilbao
- Spain
| | - G. Gorni
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio (ICV-CSIC)
- 28049 Madrid
- Spain
| | | | - L. Pascual
- Instituto de Catálisis y Petroleoquímica (ICP-CSIC)
- 28049 Madrid
- Spain
| | - A. Durán
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio (ICV-CSIC)
- 28049 Madrid
- Spain
| | - M. J. Pascual
- Instituto de Cerámica y Vidrio (ICV-CSIC)
- 28049 Madrid
- Spain
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