Nanosecond nonlinear optical and gamma radiation shielding behavior of Eu2O3 doped lanthanum containing heavy metal borate glasses: a comparative investigation

Development of next-generation photonic device necessitates employing vitreous materials with high optical nonlinearities and low optical limiting thresholds. Additionally, the high nonlinear photonic glasses are suitable for nuclear radiation shielding applications. Herein, the borate-based glass specimens bearing significant amounts of heavy metal oxides (Bi2O3 and PbO) activated with various quantities of Eu2O3 have been explored for optical limiting, nonlinear photonic, and nuclear radiation shielding applications. Efficacy of Eu2O3 content on functional features has been assessed and discussed the outcomes in detail. The open aperture Z-scan results unveiled the enhancement in two-photon absorption coefficient and reduction in optical limiting threshold with Eu2O3 amount in the glass composition. Further, certain fundamental attenuation factors such as mass attenuation and linear attenuation coefficients were estimated utilizing Phy–X software in the energy ranges between 0.284 and 2.506 MeV. The mass attenuation and the linear attenuation coefficients were found to improve with the inclusion of more and more Eu2O3 in the glass compositions. The outcomes of the study clearly revealed that the high Eu2O3 activated lanthanum heavy metal borate glasses are productive in optical limiting, nonlinear optical, and gamma radiation shielding strategies to cutoff the high energy electromagnetic and nuclear radiations. The comparative study further validates that the La2O3–Bi2O3–B2O3–Eu2O3 glasses are more advantageous than La2O3–PbO–B2O3–Eu2O3 glasses. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.