Obtaining enhanced up-conversion efficiency in rare earth ions doped inorganic glass by means of noble metal nanoparticles (NPs) embedment remains challenging. For the first time, we report the combined effects of silver (Ag) and titania (TiO2) NPs embedment on the structural and absorption characteristics of dysprosium (Dy3+) doped tellurite glass. Transparent and thermally stable glass samples were prepared using conventional melt quenching method and characterized via spectroscopic techniques. The production of the strong electric field in the proximity of Dy3+ ion due to the localized surface plasmon (LSP) of embedded metallic NPs was found to improve the glass absorption properties. The effects of bimetallic NPs in changing the structure and absorption properties were found to be better than singly included metallic NP (either Ag or TiO2). This improvement in the absorption behavior was attributed to the combined LSP resonance (LSPR) effects of Ag and TiO2 NPs which transferred strong local electric field into the Dy3+ ions positioned in their vicinity. The UV-Vis-NIR spectra revealed six absorption bands centerted at 1690, 1283, 1097, 904, 800 and 755 nm which were allocated to the transition from 6H15/2 ground state to various excited states (6H11/2, 6F11/2, 6F9/2, 6F7/2, 6F5/2 and 6F3/2) of Dy3+ ion. Furthermore, the Raman spectra of such bimetallic NPs included glass system exhibited Raman peak shift accompanied by intensity variations when compared to the glass system with only one type of NPs incorporation. This enhancement in the Raman signal was ascribed to the LSPR mediated mechansim. The synthesized glass comporition was asserted to be prospective for devices.
Elastic moduli, optical and electrical properties of mixed electronic-ionic 30Li2O-4MoO3-(66-x)TeO2-xV2O5 tellurite glass system
