Effects of Semiconducting Nanoparticles on Borate Glasses

HSC 2137

Nanomaterials have different physical properties than their macroscopic counterparts. One of the properties that vary among nanomaterials is their optical properties. By varying the composition of the lead borate glasses and semiconducting nanomaterials we can witness the changes of the optical band gap. In this lab we created glasses of a general composition (x%)PbO-(99-x%)B₂O₃-(1%)CdSe with PbO ranging between 39%-69%). The samples were made by melting the compound in a box furnace at 950ºC and then were quenched and annealed for one hour in a tube furnace at 400ºC to remove thermal strains. These glasses were then smoothed and polished on a lapping machine. The polished samples were taken to a Cary 500 UV-VIS Spectrophotometer to measure optical absorption of the samples in a range from 300nm-900nm to find the optical band gap by analyzing the optical edge of the samples. We used the program Origin to determine optical band gap values and the transition types of the glasses. Early results show significant effects on the base glass by introducing CdSe nanoparticles.