Effect of Pb-ions on the kinetics of devitrification and viscosities of AlF3-based glasses for waveguide fabrication

Aluminium fluoride glasses doped with different concentrations of Pb2+ have been analyzed for their devitrification characteristics. The kinetics of devitrification, using isothermal and non-isothermal calorimetric techniques, were studied for PbF2-containing glass compositions: 99-x99(39AlF3–6MgF2–22CaF2–6SrF2–6BaF2–10LiF–8NaF–2NaPO3)–xPbF2–1NdF3, in which the concentrations of PbF2 were varied between 0.34 mol% and 15 mol%. Based on the kinetics of devitrification, we comment on the thermal stability of PbF2-containing fluoroaluminate glasses.