Thermal and spectroscopic properties of Nd3+-doped novel fluorogallate glass

• A novel Nd3+-doped fluorogallate glass is reported in this paper.
• Thermal properties of the glass have been compared with other commercialized glasses.
• Two absorption bands at 2.6 and 5.2 μm are discovered in the transmittance spectrum.
• With broad emission bandwidth, the glass shows potential for ultrashort-pulse lasers.

An Nd3+-doped fluorogallate glass with better thermal stability (Tg = 650.5 °C, ΔT = 190 °C), and lower linear thermal expansion coefficient (8.7 × 10−6/°C) compared with other commercialized laser glasses is reported in this paper. Judd–Ofelt theory is applied to the absorption spectrum of the glass to derive the intensity parameters (Ωt), which are in turn used to calculate the radiative properties of Nd3+ luminescent levels. The developed glass possesses the widest effective emission bandwidth (Δλeff = 49 nm) ever reported at around 1.07 μm, large gain bandwidth parameter (σem × Δλeff = 102.9 × 10−27 cm3), and high fluorescence quantum efficiency (η = 66%). These results indicate that this new kind of material is an interesting candidate for laser applications.