Optical absorption intensities of trivalent erbium in a 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA) polymeric host

The standard Judd-Ofelt model has been applied to the room temperature absorption intensities of Er3+(4f11) transitions in a plastic host 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate, referred to as HEMA, to determine the three phenomenological intensity parameters: Ω2, Ω4, and Ω6. Values are used to determine the spectroscopic quality factor for Er3+ in HEMA and are compared to those for Er3+ in crystalline hosts. The intensity parameters are subsequently used to determine the radiative decay rates and branching ratios of the Er3+ transitions from the upper multiplet manifolds to the corresponding lower-lying multiplet manifolds 2S+1LJ of Er3+(4f11) in HEMA. Using the radiative decay rates for Er3+(4f11) transitions between the corresponding excited states and the lower-lying states, the radiative lifetimes of eight excited states are determined.