Optical diffraction of second-harmonic signals in the LiBO2-Nb2O5 glasses induced by self-organized LiNbO3 crystallites -: art. no. 091113

The nanocrystallites (approximate to 3 nm) of LiNbO3, evolved in the (100-x)LiBO2-xNb(2)O(5) (5 <= x <= 20, in molar ratio) glass system exhibited intense second-harmonic signals in transmission mode when exposed to infrared (IR) light at lambda=1064 nm. The second-harmonic waves were found to undergo optical diffraction which was attributed to the presence of self-organized submicrometer-sized LiNbO3 crystallites that were grown within the glass matrix along the parallel damage fringes created by the IR laser radiation. Micro-Raman studies carried out on the laser-irradiated samples confirmed the self-organized crystallites to be LiNbO3. (c) 2005 American Institute of Physics.