Optical properties various materials

Ordered (and partially ordered) arrays of metal sites and complexes enable the cooperation of their special electronic, magnetic and optical properties. Such materials have long been sought for their expected physical properties and applications in optics, electrooptics, superconductivity and sensors. The ordering can be by various mechanisms, such as adsorption on surfaces, intercalation into layered structures, formation of mesomorphic structures and liquid crystals, and adoption of specific crystal-packing motifs, all of which are supramolecular phenomena. Organic liquid crystals and their applications are now commonplace, and in recent years the incorporation of metal atoms into mesogenic molecules has demonstrated the occurrence of similar metallo-mesophases [20]. 

Electropolymerization of a functionalized precursor represents a straightforward method for the realization of modified electrodes endowed with specific electrochemical or optical properties. Electrode materials based on electrogenerated functional conjugated polymers and their application as electrochemical sensors have been already reviewed [162-165]. On the other hand, the sensitivity of the optical properties of ir-conjugated polymers to conformational changes has led to the realization of colorimetric sensors for the detection of various analytes extending from alkali metal ions to anions and biomolecules [165-168]. In general, the realization of sensors based on functional PTs relies on the fact that complexation at a side chain may lead to perturbation of the polymer conformation, which can be read by either electrochemical or optical methods. 

In the case of metals containing defects of various types, the positron tends to localize in these defects and, if trapped in a defect, it exhibits a characteristic lifetime that is different from annihilation with a free electron. Positron annihilation has been used extensively in the study of metals, metal oxides, alloys and semiconductors [73-81], for the reason that it is possible to determine such important characteristics of metals as the electron momentum distribution, the Fermi energy ep, the number of free electrons Zc per metal atom, and the concentration (in cm ) of such electrons in the conduction band, together with the concentration of defects and their type. These characteristics, as is well known, largely determine the mechanical, electrical, magnetic and optical properties of materials [71]. In semiconductors, movement of the Fermi level and defect concentrations can be accurately measured. These studies have established that positron methods are defect-sensitive and nondestructive in nature, as the information is carried away by the aimihilation photons and the material can be reused after the test. 

Multi-photon-induced modification of optical properties of materials including refractive index, absorbance, polarization and fluorescence appearance or wavelength shifting could be utihzed for 3D optical memory in various media, including polymers, inorganic crystals, or glasses. 

Actual crystal planes tend to be incomplete and imperfect in many ways. Nonequilibrium surface stresses may be relieved by surface imperfections such as overgrowths, incomplete planes, steps, and dislocations (see below) as illustrated in Fig. VII-5 [98, 99]. The distribution of such features depends on the past history of the material, including the presence of adsorbing impurities [100]. Finally, for sufficiently small crystals (1-10 nm in dimension), quantum-mechanical effects may alter various physical (e.g., optical) properties [101]. 

Several gemstone species occur in various colors, depending on the presence of impurities or irradiation-induced color centers. Examples are the beryl, comndum, and quart2 families. Quart2 has poor optical properties (RI = 1.55, DISP = 0.013), but becomes of gemological interest when it exhibits attractive colors. Any material can have its color modified by the addition of various impurities synthetic mby, sapphires, and spinel are produced commercially in over 100 colors (2). Synthetic cubic 2irconia has been made in essentially all colors of the spectmm (11), but only the colorless diamond imitation is produced commercially in any quantity. 

As mentioned earlier, CL is a powerful tool for the characterization of optical properties of wide band-gap materials, such as diamond, for which optical excitation sources are not readily available. In addition, electron-beam excitation of solids may produce much greater carrier generation rates than typical optical excitation. In such cases, CL microscopy and spectroscopy are valuable methods in identifying various impurities, defects, and their complexes, and in providing a powerful means for the analysis of their distribution, with spatial resolution on the order of 1 pm and less. ... 

When solids react, we would like to know at what temperature the solid state reaction takes place. If the solid decomposes to a different composition, or phase, we would like to have this knowledge so that we can predict and use that knowledge In preparation of desired materials. Sometimes, intermediate compounds form before the final phase. In this chapter, we will detail some of the measurements used to characterize the solid state and methods used to foUow solid state reactions. This will consist of various types of thermal analysis (TA), including differentlEd thermal analysis (DTA), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and measurements of optical properties. 

As already indicated above, what one may consider a surface depends on the property under consideration. Adhesion is very much an outer atomic layer issue, unless one is dealing with materials like fibreboard in which the polymer resin may also be involved in mechanical anchoring onto the wood particles. Gloss and other optical properties are related to the penetration depth of optical radiation. The latter depends on the optical properties of the material, but in general involves more than a few micrometer thickness and therewith much more than the outer atomic layers only. It is thus the penetration depth of the probing technique that needs to be suitably selected with respect to the surface problem under investigation. Examples selected for various depths (< 10 nm, 10 s of nm, 100 nm, micrometer scale) have been presented in Chapter 10 of the book by Garton on Infrared Spectroscopy of Polymer Blends, Composites and Surfaces... 

Figure 11.2. Nanowire electronic and optical properties, (a) Schematic of an NW-FET used to characterize electrical transport properties of individual NWs. (inset) SEM image of an NW-FET two metal electrodes, which correspond to source and drain, are visible at the left and right sides of the image, (b) Current versus voltage for an n-type InP NW-FET. The numbers inside the plot indicate the corresponding gate voltages (Vg). The inset shows current versus Vg for Fsd of 0.1 V. (c) Real-color photoluminescence image of various NWs shows different color emissions, (d) Spectra of individual NW photoluminescence. All NW materials show a clean band-edge emission spectrum with narrow FWHM around 20nm. (See color insert.)...

The FPI principle can also be used to develop thin-film-coating-based chemical sensors. For example, a thin layer of zeolite film has been coated to a cleaved endface of a single-mode fiber to form a low-finesse FPI sensor for chemical detection. Zeolite presents a group of crystalline aluminosilicate materials with uniform subnanometer or nanometer scale pores. Traditionally, porous zeolite materials have been used as adsorbents, catalysts, and molecular sieves for molecular or ionic separation, electrode modification, and selectivity enhancement for chemical sensors. Recently, it has been revealed that zeolites possess a unique combination of chemical and optical properties. When properly integrated with a photonic device, these unique properties may be fully utilized to develop miniaturized optical chemical sensors with high sensitivity and potentially high selectivity for various in situ monitoring applications. 

Measurements of the optical properties in this range of wavelengths can probe the fundamental electronic transitions in these nanostructures. Some of the aforementioned effects have in fact been experimentally revealed in this series of experiments (90). As mentioned above, the IF nanoparticles in this study were prepared by a careful sulfidization of oxide nanoparticles. Briefly, the reaction starts on the surface of the oxide nanoparticle and proceeds inward, and hence the number of closed (fullerene-like) sulfide layers can be controlled quite accurately during the reaction. Also, the deeper the sulfide layer in the nanoparticle, the smaller is its radius and the larger is the strain in the nanostructure. Once available in sufficient quantities, the absorption spectra of thin films of the fullerene-like particles and nanotubes were measured at various temperatures (4-300 K). The excitonic nature of the absorption of the nanoparticles was established, which is a manifestation of the semiconducting nature of the material. Furthermore, a clear red shift in the ex-citon energy, which increased with the number of sulfide layers of the nanoparticles, was also observed (see Fig. 21). The temperature dependence of the exciton... 

The photoluminescence of these nanoparticles has very different causes, depending on the type of nanomaterial semiconductor QDs luminescence by recombination of excitons, rare-earth doped nanoparticles photoluminescence by atom orbital (AO) transitions within the rare-earth ions acting as luminescent centers, and metallic nanoparticles emit light by various mechanisms. Consequently, the optical properties of luminescent nanoparticles can be very different, depending on the material they consist of. 

---