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Growth, structure, and optical properties of disordered Tm3+: CaYAlO4 crystal for 1.8 μm laser

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Abstract

A Tm3+: CaYAlO4 single crystal with disordered structure was prepared using mature Czochralski method. The influence of Tm3+ doping on the structure was studied through PXRD measurement and first-principles calculation. The PXRD pattern shows that the introduce of Tm3+ does not change the structure of CaYAlO4 matrix. Then, the spectroscopic properties of the crystal were studied in detail. The absorption spectrum was recorded. After calculating, the absorption cross-section was 5.48 × 10–20 cm2 at 798 nm and the full width at half maximum (FWHM) of the corresponding absorption band was 22 nm, indicating that the crystal could be effectively pumped by commercial AlGaAs LD. According to the measured emission spectrum, the emission cross-section was 6.14 × 10–20 cm2 at the maximum wavelength, and the FWHM of emission peak was 228 nm. The fluorescence lifetime of Tm3+: 3F4 state in Tm3+: CaYAlO4 was fitted to be 0.239 ms. Based on the gain cross-sections of the Tm3+: 3F4 → 3H6 transition, a tunable range larger than 300 nm is possible when the population inversion level reaches 50%. The above results show that the obtained Tm3+: CaYAlO4 crystal is a promising candidate for ~ 1.8 μm tunable and ultrashort pulse lasers.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by Natural Science Foundation of Shandong province (Grant No. ZR2020QE034 and ZR2021QF081), National Nature Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 11974304), Anhui Provincial Natural Science Foundation (2008085QA45, 2008085QA49).

Funding

This work was supported by Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province, ZR2020QE034, Yunyun Liu, ZR2021QF081, Yunyun Liu.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Opto-Electronic Engineering, Zaozhuang University, Zaozhuang, 277160, China

    Yunyun Liu, Junbao Wang, Lu Wang, Chuanxin Huang & Yanbin Zheng

  2. Weihai Institute for Food and Drug Control, Weihai, China

    Chenyang Jiang

  3. Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials Chemistry and Physics, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou City, Fujian Province, 350002, People’s Republic of China

    Huan Shen & Chaoyang Tu

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Contributions

YL: conceptualization, investigation, visualization, writing—original draft. CJ: formal analysis, data curation. JW: conceptualization, methodology, validation. LW: formal analysis, data curation. HS: formal analysis, data curation. CT: resources, project administration. CH: writing—review and editing, funding acquisition. YZ: supervision, writing—review and editing.

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Correspondence to Chuanxin Huang or Yanbin Zheng.

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Liu, Y., Jiang, C., Wang, J. et al. Growth, structure, and optical properties of disordered Tm3+: CaYAlO4 crystal for 1.8 μm laser. J Mater Sci: Mater Electron 34, 2250 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-023-11656-4

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