Waveguides in Ni-doped glass and glass-ceramic written with a 1 kHz femtosecond laser

Abstract

We report waveguides in Ni-doped Li2O-Ga2O 3-SiO2 (Ni:LGS) glass and glass-ceramic (GC) fabricated with a femtosecond (fs) laser with repetition rate of 1 kHz. When the glass is annealed to form a GC, the waveguides are erased. However, in the GC the waveguides are not erased by annealing. In Ni:LGS GC a 415 nm absorption band was created by fs laser waveguide writing due to the creation of Ni nanoparticles with an estimated diameter of a few nm. Raman and photoluminescence spectra of the bulk and waveguide structures were indistinguishable; however, fluorescence decay profiles indicated more long lifetime components in the waveguide compared to the bulk. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.