Formation of Thermally Induced Defects in Silica Optical Material
Characteristics of silica optical material largely depend on its thermal history. In this paper, formation of thermally induced defects in silica optical material is studied. The formation process of defect is analyzed in detail. The results show that there is an obvious difference in defect formation induced by heating treatment when the composition of silica optical material changes. Defect formation mainly displays as the produce process when the initial defects of the silica material are zero. However, defect formation expresses as the produce and annealing process when the initial defects of the silica material are not zero. The initial defect concentration can be decreased significantly when the silica material is heated in high temperature. At the same time, the new defect is also produced. These theoretic results are consistent with the previous experimental ones.