Novel special optical fibers nowadays can take advantage of several new preform production techniques. During the last years we have devoted our attention to the granulated silica method. It is one of the variants of the powder-in-tube technique and potentially offers a high degree of freedom regarding the usable dopants, the maximum possible dopant concentration, the homogeneity of the dopants, the geometry and minimal refractive index contrast. We developed and refined an approach for the production of doped granulated silica material based on the sol-gel process.Here, we present material analysis results of an ytterbium (Yb) doped, aluminum (Al) and phosphorous (P) co-doped glass on the basis of our sol-gel glass based granulated silica method as well as first measurements of two LMA fibers obtained from this material. For the material analysis we used advanced analysis techniques, such as HAADF-STEM and STEM-EDX spectroscopy to determine the composition of the material and the distribution of the dopants and the codopants. The chemical mapping of the STEM-EDX shows an extremely homogeneous distribution of the dopants and co-dopants in nano-scale. Based on self-made LMA fibers, we measured the refractive index contrast of the sol-gelbased granulated silica derived core compared to the pure silica cladding. In addition we quantified optical characteristics such as the emission and absorption spectrum. The measured upper state lifetime of the optical active dopant ytterbium was 0.99ms, which in turn confirms the homogeneous distribution of the Yb atoms. The propagation losses were determined to be 0.2dB/m at 633nm and 0.02414dB/m at1550nm.
In the recent past we have studied the granulated silica method as a versatile and cost effective way of fiber preform production. We have used the sol-gel technology combined with a laser-assisted remelting step to produce high homogeneity rare earth or transition metal-activated microsized particles for the fiber core. For the fiber cladding pure or index-raised granulated silica has been employed. Silica glass tubes, appropriately filled with these granular materials, are then drawn to fibers, eventually after an optional quality enhancing vitrification step. The process offers a high degree of compositional flexibility with respect to dopants; it further facilitates to achieve high concentrations even in cases when several dopants are used and allows for the implementation of fiber microstructures. By this "rapid preform production" technique, that is also ideally suited for the preparation of microstructured optical fibers, several fibers have been produced and three of them will be presented here.
Fabrication of Ytterbium--doped active fibers with different designs, compositions and high Yb concentration has attracted an intense interest. For making highly Yb--doped fibers, co--dopants like phosphorous (P) and aluminum (Al) are also employed in order to modify refractive index and increase Yb solubility, avoiding clusters and phase segregations. Indeed, Yb--clustering results in quenching effects and increased propagation losses due to energy transfer between clustered ions. Therefore, the chemical composition and phase homogeneity of the fiber core have key influences on the performance of an active fiber. However, conventional fabrication techniques such as MCVD (modified chemical vapor deposition) and OVD (outside vapor deposition) are approaching the limit.In this contribution, we have developed an approach for fabrication of such active fibres based on granulated silica derived from the sol--gel process. The advantage of this method is the fabrication of active fibers with high dopant contents and homogeneity. Here, using high angle annular dark--field scanning transmission electron microscopy (HAADF--STEM) in atomic scale, we report the direct, nano--scale and atomic--resolution observation of individual Yb dopant and co--dopant (i.e. Al, P) atoms for different fabricated fibers. The chemical mapping from STEM--EDX shows an extremely homogeneous distribution of the dopants and co--dopants in nano--scale for our fabrication protocol. However in atomic resolution, we also identified the possible Yb clusters in the range of 10 atoms within the core structure. The size, structure, and distribution of these clusters are determined with an Yb--atom detection efficiency of almost 100% by STEM.
Monolithically integrated Cu(In,Ga)Se2 mini‐modules were fabricated in order to reduce the width of patterning related dead area. The Cu(In,Ga)Se2 layers were prepared on soda‐lime glasses using the multistage process at low substrate temperature below 500 °C. A picosecond laser with a wavelength of 532 nm was used for all of the structuring processes (P1, P2, and P3) for the monolithic integration. A “lift‐off” type structuring was applied for P1 and P3, and an “ablation” type was for P2. The laser structuring was optimized to be minimizing the dead area width, and the width of about 70 µm was successfully achieved. A mini‐module, in which the optimized structuring processes were applied for the integration, demonstrated a certified efficiency of 16.6%. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
A beam monitor detector prototype based on doped silica fibres coupled to optical fibres has been designed, constructed and tested, mainly for accelerators used in medical applications. Scintillation light produced by Ce and Sb doped silica fibres moving across the beam has been measured, giving information on beam position, shape and intensity. Mostly based on commercial components, the detector is easy to install, to operate and no electronic components are located near the beam. Tests have been performed with a 2 MeV proton pulsed beam at an average current of 0.8 µA. The response characteristics of Sb doped silica fibres have been studied for the first time.
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