Systematic z-scan measurements of the third order nonlinearity of chalcogenide glasses

We report measurements of the third order optical nonlinearity of 51 chalcogenide glasses in the near infrared. Substituting more polarizable elements (Se for S, Sb for As) into the glasses increased their nonlinearity but also reduced the optical bandgap increasing two-photon absorption. Overall the measured values are an extremely good fit to the semi-empirical Miller's rule whilst the normalized real and imaginary parts are in satisfactory agreement with the scaling for indirect gap semiconductors reported by Dinu. At 1550nm we find that there is an upper limit to the nonlinearity of approximate to 10(-13)cm(2)/W above which two-photon absorption becomes significant. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America