1. Wideband Infrared Emission from Yb3+- and Nd3+-Doped Bi2O3–B2O3Glass Phosphor for an Optical Coherence Tomography Light Source
- Author
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Ayako Sakano, Yoshikazu Takeda, and Shingo Fuchi
- Subjects
Materials science ,Physics and Astronomy (miscellaneous) ,medicine.diagnostic_test ,business.industry ,Infrared ,General Engineering ,General Physics and Astronomy ,chemistry.chemical_element ,Phosphor ,Neodymium ,law.invention ,Wavelength ,Optics ,Optical coherence tomography ,chemistry ,law ,medicine ,Optoelectronics ,business ,Luminescence ,Light-emitting diode ,Diode - Abstract
We have investigated the spectroscopic properties of Bi2O3–B2O3 glasses doped with Nd3+ and Yb3+ separately, and doubly doped with the same ions, in order to search for appropriate phosphors for an optical coherence tomography (OCT) light source. The effects of Yb3+ and Nd3+ co-doping and varying Yb3+ concentration on the spectrum shape were studied to obtain an optimum line shape for OCT. We successfully obtained a Gaussian-like shape spectrum from 5.0Yb2O3–1.0Nd2O3–46.0Bi2O3–46.0B2O3 (in nominal molar composition) with a full-width-at-half-maximum (FWHM) of 101 nm in the wavelength region around 1000 nm. This FWHM corresponds to a depth resolution of 4.5 µm, which is about twice that of conventional light emitting diodes (LEDs) and super luminescent diodes (SLDs). The Gaussian-like line shape is very important to suppress ghost images in OCT. These results indicate that a Yb3+, Nd3+ co-doped Bi2O3–B2O3 glass phosphor can indeed be applied as a new type of OCT light source.
- Published
- 2008