The investigation of optical and mechanical properties of Er3+ doped Ga-As-S glasses quenched in different medias

Er3+ doped Ga-As-S glasses were produced by the melting of the appropriate amounts of starting materials in rocking furnace. Different quenching medias such as water (25 °C), heat resistant oil (130 °C) and salt batch (130 °C) were selected to obtain high mechanical properties. Salt batch (NaNO3 + KNO3) was selected as the optimum quenching media. There was two steps in following study. First, the concentration of Er3+ was kept fixed at 0.5 wt% and the effects of Ga (1-4 at.%) on the glass system were studied. The glass with 1 at.% was selected as optimum composition since it has the best transmission in IR range and also the best emission at 1535 nm. In the second step, various amounts of Er3+ (0.5-2 wt%) were added to the optimum composition which was chosen in the first step. The emission intensity at 1535 nm was increased with increasing Er3+ concentration.