Mesoscale Engineering of Photonic Glass for Tunable Luminescence

Manipulating the mesoscale structure enables broadband emission from glass and fibre optic cables. To produce compact light sources for applications such as broadband telecommunication and surgical microscopy, researchers are experimenting with glass and fibres with luminescent cores that are doped with transition-metal ions. Shifeng Zhou from the South China University of Technology and co-workers have discovered that medium-range interactions between dopants and their host matrix can significantly widen emitted wavelength ranges to give brighter, broader light sources. Applying mesoscale engineering approach for a tantalate glass system produced localized heterogeneous regions, which can isolate emission centres. The team demonstrated the potential of this pioneering strategy by constructing glass and optical fibre with tunable luminescent output, and extremely broad bandwidth up to ~480 nm which is the largest value ever reported in doped glass to date.