Laser conditioning and multi-shot laser damage accumulation effects of HfO2/SiO2 antireflective coatings

Laser conditioning effects of the HfO2/SiO2 antireflective (AR) coatings at 1064 nm and the accumulation effects of multishot laser radiation were investigated. The HfO2/SiO2 AR coatings were prepared by E-beam evaporation (EBE). The singleshot and multi-shot laser induced damage threshold was detected following ISO standard 11254-1.2, and the laser conditioning was conducted by three-step raster scanning method. It was found that the single-shot LIDT and multi-shot LIDT was almost the same. The damage mostly > 80% occurred in the first shot under multi-shot laser radiation, and after that the damage occurring probability plummeted to < 5%. There was no obvious enhancement of the laser damage resistance for both the single-shot and multi-shot laser radiation of the AR coatings after laser conditioning. A Nomarski microscope was employed to map the damage morphology, and it found that the damage behavior is defect-initiated for both unconditioned and conditioned samples. © 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Effects of CO2 laser conditioning of the antireflection Y2O3/SiO2 coatings at 351 nm

Y2O3/SiO2 coatings were deposited on fused silica by electron beam evaporation. A continuous wave CO2 laser was used to condition parts of the prepared samples at different scanning speeds in the air. LAMBDA 900 spectrometer was used to investigate the changes of the transmittance and residual reflection spectrum. A Nomarski microscope under dark field was used to examine the changes of the micro defect density. The changes of the surface roughness and the microstructure of the film before and after conditioning were investigated by AFM and X-ray diffraction, respectively. We found that laser-induced damage threshold (LIDT) of the films conditioning at 30 mm/s scanning speed was increased by more than a factor of 3 over the thresholds of the as-deposited films. The conditioning effect was correlated with an irradiation-induced decrease of the defect density and absorption of the films. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

沉积参量及时效时间对SiO2薄膜残余应力的影响

SiO2薄膜由电子束蒸发方法沉积而成。用GPI数字波面光学干涉仪测量了不同沉积条件下玻璃基底镀膜前后曲率半径的变化，并确定了SiO2薄膜中的残余应力。在其他条件相同的情况下，当沉积温度由190℃升高到350℃时，SiO2薄膜中的压应力由一156MPa增大为-289MPa。氧分压由3．0×10^-3Pa升高到13．0×10^-3Pa时，SiO2薄膜中的应力由-223．5MPa变为20．4MPa。通过对薄膜折射率的测量，发现薄膜的堆积密度随沉积条件的改变也发生了规律性的变化。应力的变化主要是由于沉积时蒸发粒子

Microstructure and laser-induced damage threshold of ZrO2 coatings dependence on annealing temperature

ZrO2 coatings were deposited on different substrates of Yb:YAG and fused silica by electron beam evaporation. After annealed for 12 h at 673 and 1073 K, respectively, weak absorption of coatings was measured by surface thermal lensing (STL) technique, and then laser-induced damage threshold (LIDT) was determined also. The crystalline phase of ZrO2 coatings and the size of the crystal grain were investigated by X-ray diffraction. It was found that microstructure of ZrO2 coatings was dependent on both annealing temperature and substrate structure, and coatings containing monoclinic phases had higher damage threshold than others. Due to the strong absorption of Yb:YAG, damage threshold of coatings on Yb:YAG was much less than that on fused silica. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Effect of microstructure of TiO2 thin films on optical band gap energy

TiO2 coatings are prepared on fused silica with conventional electron beam evaporation deposition. After annealed at different temperatures for four hours, the spectra and XRD patterns of TiO2 thin film are obtained. XRD patterns reveal that only anatase phase can be observed in TiO2 coatings regardless of the different annealing temperatures, and with the increasing annealing temperature, the grain size gradually increases. The relationship between the energy gap and microstructure of anatase is determined and discussed. The quantum confinement effect is observed that with the increasing grain size of TiO2 thin film, the band gap energy shifts from 3.4 eV to 3.21 eV. Moreover, other possible influence of the TiO2 thin-film microstructure, such as surface roughness and thin film absorption, on band gap energy is also expected.

氧分压对电子束蒸发SiO2薄膜机械性质和光学性质的影响

采用ZYGO MarkⅢ-GPI数字波面干涉仪、NamoScopeⅢa型原子力显微镜对不同氧分压下电子束蒸发方法制备的SiO2薄膜中的残余应力及表面形貌进行了研究，结果发现：随着氧分压的增大，薄膜中的压应力值逐渐减小，最后变为张应力状态；同时薄膜的表面粗糙度也随着氧分压的增大而逐渐增大，另外，折射率对氧分压也非常敏感，随着氧分压的增大呈现出了减小的趋势，这些现象主要是由于氧分压的改变使得SiO2薄膜结构发生了变化引起的。

应用离子后处理技术提高薄膜激光损伤阈值

利用电子束热蒸发方法在K9玻璃基底上沉积氧化锆薄膜,并对其中一些样品用低能O2^+进行了后处理.采用表面热透镜技术测量薄膜样品表面弱吸收,采用显微镜观察样品离子后处理前后的显微缺陷密度.测试结果表明:经离子后处理样品表面的缺陷密度从18.6/mm^2降低到6.2/mm^2,且其激光损伤阈值从15.9 J/cm^2提高到23.1 J/cm^2,样品的平均吸收率从处理前的1.147×10^-4降低到处理后的9.56×10^-5.通过对处理前后样品的表面微缺陷密度、吸收率及损伤形貌等的分析发现:离子后处理可以降

氧分压对ZrO2薄膜激光损伤阈值的影响

在不同的氧分压下用电子束热蒸发的方法制备了ZrO2薄膜。分别通过X射线衍射、光学光谱、热透镜技术、抗激光辐照等测试，对所制备样品的微结构、折射率、吸收率及激光损伤阈值进行了测量。实验结果表明，薄膜中晶粒主要是四方相为主的多晶结构，并且随着氧分压的增加，结晶度、折射率以及弱吸收均逐渐降低。薄膜的激光损伤阈值开始随着氧分压增加从18．5J／cm^2逐渐增加，氧分压为9×10^-3Pa时达到最大，值为26．7J／cm^2，氧分压再增加时则又降低到17．5J／cm^2。由此可见，氧分压引起的薄膜微结构变化是ZrO

Laser induced damage of multi-layer dielectric used in pulse compressor gratings

Laser induced damage threshold (LIDT) of multi-layer dielectric used in pulse compressor gratings (PCG) was investigated. The sample was prepared by e-beam evaporation (EBE). LIDT was detected following ISO standard 11254-1.2. It was found that LIDTs of normal and 51.2 deg. incidence (transverse electric (TE) mode) were 14.14 and 9.31 J/cm2, respectively. A Nomarski microscope was employed to map the damage morphology, and it was found that the damage behavior was pit-concave-plat structure for normal incidence, while it was pit structure for 51.2 deg. incidence with TE mode. The electric field distribution was calculated to illuminate the difference of LIDT between the two incident cases.

Laser-induced damage morphology of high-reflective optical coatings

Two different kinds of 1064 nm high-reflective (HR) coatings, with and without SiO2 protective layer, were prepared by electron beam evaporation. Three-dimensional damage morphology, caused by a Nd:YAG pulsed laser, was investigated for these HR coatings. Development of laser-induced damage on HR coatings was revealed by both temperature field calculation and discrete meso-element simulation. Theoretical results met experimental very well. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Influence of negative ion element impurities on laser induced damage threshold of HfO2 thin film

Negative ion element impurities breakdown model in HfO2 thin film was reported in this paper. The content of negative ion elements were detected by glow discharge mass spectrum analysis (GDMS); HfO2 thin films were deposited by the electron-beam evaporation method. The weak absorption and laser induced damage threshold (LIDT) of HfO2 thin films were measured to testify the negative ion element impurity breakdown model. It was found that the LIDT would decrease and the absorption would increase with increasing the content of negative ion element. These results indicated that negative ion elements were harmful impurities and would speed up the damage of thin film. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

倾斜角沉积技术制备ZnS双折射雕塑薄膜

使用倾斜角沉积（GLAD）的电子束蒸发技术，制备了倾斜角度在60°～85°之间的ZnS双折射雕塑薄膜（STF）。使用X射线衍射（XRD）和扫描电镜（SEM）检测了ZnS薄膜的结晶状态和断面形貌，使用Lamda-900分光光度计测量了薄膜在不同的偏振光入射时的透过率。研究发现，室温下倾斜沉积ZnS薄膜断面为倾斜柱状结构，且薄膜的结晶程度不高。在相同的监控厚度时，随倾斜角度增大，沉积到基片上的薄膜厚度逐渐变小，但仍然大于余弦曲线显示的理论厚度。根据偏振光垂直入射时薄膜的透过光谱计算了不同角度沉积的薄膜的折射率

Investigation on microstructure and optical properties of titanium dioxide coatings annealed at various temperature

TiO2 coatings were prepared on fused silica with conventional electron beam evaporation deposition. After TiO2 thin films were annealed at different temperatures for 4 h, several properties were investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), spectrometer.. photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and AFM. It was found that with the annealing temperature increasing, the transmittance of TiO2 coatings decreased, and the cutoff wavelength shifted to long wavelength in near ultraviolet band. Especially, when coatings were annealed at high temperature, the optical loss is very serious, which can be attributed to the scattering and the absorption of TiO2 coatings. XRD patterns revealed that only anatase phase was observed in TiO2 coatings regardless of the different annealing temperatures. XPS results indicated that the fine chemical shift of TiO2 2p(1/2) should be attributed to existence of oxygen vacancies around Ti+4 ion. The investigation on surface morphology by AFM showed that the RMS of titania thin films gradually increases from less than 0.40 nm to 5.03 nm and it should be ascribed to the growth of titanium dioxide grain size with the increase of annealing temperature. (C) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Stress, absorptance and laser-induced damage threshold properties of 355-nm HR coatings

A number of 355-nm Al2O3/MgF2 high-reflectance (HR) coatings were prepared by electron-beam evaporation. The influences of the number of coating layers and deposition temperature on the 355-nm Al2O3/MgF2 HR coatings were investigated. The stress was measured by viewing the substrate deformation before and after coating deposition using an optical interferometer. The laser-induced damage threshold (LIDT) of the samples was measured by a 355-nm Nd:YAG laser with a pulse width of 8 ns. Transmittance and reflectance of the samples were measured by a Lambda 900 spectrometer. It was found that absorptance was the main reason to result in a low LIDT of 355-nm Al2O3/MgF2 HR coatings. The stress in Al2O3/MgF2 HR coatings played an unimportant role in the LIDT, although MgF2 is known to have high tensile stress.

Layer uniformity of glancing angle deposition

Some results of an investigation on the layer thickness uniformity of glancing angle deposition are presented. A zirconia monolayer has been deposited by glancing angle deposition to analyze the layer thickness uniformity. The experimental results indicate that the thickness variation over the substrate is less than 0. 1%, which is considered as good uniformity. It is found that the non-uniformity of experimental results is larger than that of the theoretical results. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.