Optical properties of Nd3+-doped La2CaB10O19 crystals with different Nd3+ concentrations

La2CaB10O19 (LCB) is a new NLO crystal, in which Nd3+ can be doped with different concentrations to be self-frequency doubling crystals. We obtained seven LCB crystals with different Nd3+ concentrations grown by flux method. Refractive indices, absorption spectra and fluorescence spectra of the seven LCB crystals with various Nd3+ doping concentrations have been measured and evaluated. It has been found that the 5 mol% Nd doped LCB crystal is most appropriate to be a laser material, by fitting the absorption spectrum with the Judd-Ofelt theory, radiative lifetime tau(r) of Nd3+ in the 5 mol% Nd doped LCB crystal is determined to be 237.8 mu s. For the 5 mol% Nd doped LCB crystal, the absorption cross section at 799 nm and the emission cross section at 1050 nm are 4.52 x 10(-20) and 1.29 x 10(-19) cm(2), respectively. The measured fluorescence lifetime tau(f) the 5 mol% Nd doped LCB crystal is 85 us and its quantum efficiency is 35.7%. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.