Absorption and scattering in photo-thermo-refractive glass induced by UV-exposure and thermal development

• Induced absorption and scattering in PTR glass are studied.
• Induced absorption is produced by several types of silver containing particles.
• Structure of the induced absorption depends on thermal development schedule.
• Scattering obeys Rayleigh exponential formula with forth power.
• Dependence of scattering on processing procedure is explained.

Photo-thermo-refractive (PTR) glass is a multicomponent photosensitive silicate glass that, after successive UV-exposure and thermal treatment, exhibits a refractive index change that results from the precipitation of nano-crystalline NaF. This glass is successfully used for the fabrication of holographic optical elements (volume Bragg gratings) that dramatically enhance properties of numerous laser systems and spectrometers. In this paper, induced absorption and scattering that determine efficiency of such elements were studied. It is found that the main contribution to induced absorption is produced by several types of silver containing particles having absorption bands with maxima in the blue-green region with exponential tails extending to the near IR spectral region. Evolution of all absorption bands was studied for different conditions of UV exposure and thermal development. Complex mechanisms of interconversion of silver containing particles is demonstrated as well as the fact that some of these particles can be associated with catalyzers of the nucleation process. It is also found that induced scattering obeys the classic Rayleigh law with an intensity depending on the conditions of UV exposure and thermal development. For short development times, scattering increases with dosage because of increased volume fraction of crystalline phase. For long development times, scattering decreases with dosage because of decreased size of individual crystals.