Incorporation of Cesium Ions into Glasses through a Staining Method
Tatsuya SUETSUGU, Naoto YAMASHITA, Takashi WAKASUGI and Kohei KADONO
Abstract:In order to extend the potential application of the staining, which has been used only for coloring glasses, we have investigated the Cs-staining as a new staining technique other than Ag and Cu-staining. At first, we prepared new Cs-stains consisting of Cs2SO4-Na2SO4, Cs2SO4-CsCl mixed salts, or CsNO3. The Cs-staining was carried out at 500 ~ 600 °C for 12 ~ 96 hours using commercially available borosilicate (BK7®) and soda-lime silicate (B270®) glasses as substrates. Elemental analyses and X-ray microanalyses showed that Cs+ ions were incorporated into the surface area of the glass substrates. The refractive indices measured by a prism coupling method at 633 nm increased by 0.01 to 0.02. The measurements also indicated that the light was propagated in the stained area showing that the waveguides were successfully formed. Key Words:Borosilicate glass, Soda-lime silicate glass, Ion-exchange, Staining, Cesium, Graded-index, Refractive index, Waveguide