Synthesis and characterization of rare earth-doped silica nanoparticles for optimizing vapor phase doping technique

The synthesis of rare earth-doped aluminosilicate soot particles through vapor phase doping technique has been systematically investigated to achieve better control of rare earth homogeneity in silica glass. The experiments were designed to establish the correlation of process conditions with the physicochemical properties of the formed soot particles. Attained results depict that the characteristics of soot particles are much dependent on vapor phase compositions as well as the deposition temperature. Doping of alumina/rare earth oxide into silica matrix lowers the viscosity of the glass material at a level where size of soot particles becomes independent of deposition temperature. But dopant concentration in the formed soot samples moderately depends on the main burner temperature and by altering it appropriately one can eliminate soot layer sintering step. The paper also reports on the optimum conditions which are necessary to produce rare earth-doped preforms of better homogeneity and thus, assist in achieving greater control over the process technology of vapor phase doping. As per the authors' knowledge, this investigation presents completely new findings which have not been reported by any other research group earlier