Measurement of the third-order nonlinear refractive index of vanadium oxide nanoscrolls
Adams, Charles Hubert
:
2012-12-20
Abstract
Vanadium dioxide is a strongly correlated electronic material which undergoes a
phase transition from a semiconducting to metallic state when illuminated with an intense
electric field. This phase transition marks interest in using VO2 as an optical limiter In
this work, the z-scan method is used to find the third order nonlinear index n2 of VOx
nanoscrolls prepared via a sol-gel method and then suspended in a liquid. The nonlinear
index is then compared to the third order nonlinear index of multi-wall carbon nanotubes
(also suspended in a liquid), and gold nanoparticles implanted in glass. Both the VOx
nanoscrolls and multi-wall carbon nanotubes have similar n2, while the gold nanoparticles
exhibit a much larger nonlinear index.