We report on the optical spectroscopy of the silica sol–gel glass doped with
chromium of various valences where Cr6+ and Cr5+ ions appear to be most active.
The presence of the Cr5+ ions in six-fold coordination is seen in the luminescence
spectra and decays whereas the Cr6+ ions in four-fold coordination are mostly
responsible for the excited state absorption (ESA), but also give a contribution to
the luminescence. We interpret the ESA in terms of transitions between
crystal field split terms of the Cr5+O− centre which forms after the charge
transfer (CT) transition, and between one of those terms and another,
double-electron state of larger electron–lattice coupling, which forms after two
consecutive transitions of electrons via the CT transition. The luminescence
and decay characteristics are due to the composition of the transitions
in both Cr5+ and Cr5+O− centres, the former interpreted in terms of the
Jahn–Teller effect in the d1 system in the octahedral coordination, along
with the nuances associated with that effect; the latter ones being the
triplet–singlet or singlet–singlet transitions depending on temperature.