Nature of radiation colour centres in single crystals of yttrium aluminum garnet

Abstract Single crystal of yttrium aluminum garnet Y 3 Al 5 O 12 (YAG), doped by neodymium ions, are widely used as the active medium of optical quantum generators. As a result of this fact many works are devoted to the radiation colour centres (CC). However, identification of CC in garnets is contradictive. In the present paper brief analysis of CC observed in the YAG lattice and the results of the study made by the authors of this paper are given.