The impact of glass structure on photoinduced changes in amorphous chalcogenides

It is shown that the photostructural changes introduced during irradiation of chaclogenide glasses are dependent on the glass structure and composition. Photodarkening experiments performed on a series of As-S-Se glass suggest that the photostructural changes decrease as the network connectivity tends to an average coordination value of <r>=2.4. Photorelaxation experiments perfomed on Ge-Se glasses show that contamination with oxygen does not appear to significantly affect photostrucral changes. On the contrary, the addition of CsCl in a Ge-Sb-S glass appears to suppress photostrucral effects entirely.