Structural incorporation of silver in soda-lime glass by the ion-exchange process: a photoluminescence spectroscopy study

The structural incorporation of silver in ion-exchanged soda-lime glass is investigated by studying spectral and time-resolved photoluminescence as a function of the temperature. The observed spectroscopic features are related to silver electronic state coupling, following a progressive rearrangement of the Ag+ ion environment at increasing silver incorporation in glass. The bi-exponential luminescence decay at various temperatures in the range 80–294 K is interpreted on the basis of a four-level model. In particular, the energy splitting of the two lower excited states is observed to increase with the silver concentration in glass. The temperature dependence of the slow and fast decay times is related to the thermal quenching of the emission from the lower excited states to the ground state.