Preparation and optical properties of sodium borosilicate glasses containing Sb nanoparticles

•The Sb nanoparticles doped in Na2O–B2O3–SiO2 glass were prepared by sol–gel methods.•Obtained glass was investigated by structural and optical measurements.•The glass was crystalline with a rhombohedral structure of Sb.•An absorption peak centered on 566 nm has been observed in doping glass.•The third-order optical nonlinearity was investigated by femtosecond Z-scan technique.

Sb nanoparticles have been successfully prepared from SbCl3 in sodium borosilicate (Na2O–B2O3–SiO2) glass matrix by sol–gel method, involving metallic sodium as sodium source, boric acid as boron source and SiO2 come from hydrolysis of tetraethoxysilane. The feasibility of process conditions were analyzed by using Fourier Transform Infrared (FT-IR), thermal gravimetric (TG), and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). X-ray diffraction (XRD) study revealed that the rhombohedral structure of metal Sb have formed in the glass. The particle was found to be spherical shaped and highly monodispersed with an average size of about 32.63 nm as analyzed from transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The surface plasmon resonance (SPR) of Sb nanoparticle was studied from the UV–Vis absorption. The nonlinear optical properties were studied by using the Z-scan technique with a Ti:sapphire laser at 800 nm. Results showed that the third-order optical nonlinear susceptibility χ(3) of the glass was determined to be 4.85 × 10−11 esu.