SiO₂-SnO₂: Er3+ glass-ceramic monoliths

The development of efficient luminescent systems, such as microcavities, solid-state lasers, integrated optical amplifiers, and optical sensors is the main topic in glass photonics. The building blocks of these systems are glass-ceramics activated by rare-earth ions because they exhibit specific morphologic, structural, and spectroscopic properties. Among various materials that could be used as nanocrystals to be imbedded in a silica matrix, tin dioxide presents some interesting peculiarities, e.g., the presence of tin dioxide nanocrystals allows an increase in both solubility and emission of rare-earth ions. Here, we focus our attention on Er³⁺-doped silica-tin dioxide photonic glass-ceramics fabricated by a sol-gel route. Although the SiO₂-SnO₂:Er³⁺ could be fabricated in different forms, such as thin films, monoliths, and planar waveguides, we herein limit ourselves to the monoliths. The effective role of tin dioxide as a luminescence sensitizer for Er³⁺ ions is confirmed by spectroscopic measurements and detailed fabrication protocols are discussed.