O desenvolvimento de laseres de estado sólido compacto operando na região do infravermelho médio, entre 2 - 5 ?m, tem recebido considerável atenção nos últimos anos. Esses dispositivos oferecem grande potencial como fonte de luz para uma infinidade de aplicações, como por exemplo laseres para medicina e sensores químicos remotos. Laseres operando na região de 2.8 ?m tem interesse particular na medicina devido a forte banda de absorção da água nessa região espectral. Para se conseguir forte emissão laser próximo a 2.8 ?m têm sido investigadas famílias de vidros não-óxidos, como por exemplo vidros fluoretos de metais pesados e vidros chalcogenetos, dopados com Er3+. Entretanto esses vidros são caros, difíceis de serem feitos, além de serem tóxicos. Por essa razão o desenvolvimento de um vidro óxido seria ideal, já que são mais baratos, relativamente fáceis de serem produzidos, além de não serem tóxicos. A desvantagem dos vidros óxidos é a sua alta energia de fônons, quando comparada aos vidros haletos e chalcogenetos, que aumenta a taxa de transição não radiativa. Seria interessante investigar um sistema vítreo que tivesse propriedades otimizadas, ou seja, boas propriedades ópticas, térmicas e mecânicas, e baixa energia de fônons. O sistema vítreo aluminato de cálcio seria um candidato para essas aplicações, já que preenche essas exigências. Porém não há na literatura informações a respeito da influência de pequenas quantidades de elementos terras raras nas propriedades desses vidros, e qual é a concentração ideal desses íons. O objetivo dessa tese foi investigar composições de vidros aluminato de cálcio (48,1 CaO : 40.8 Al2O3 : 4.1 MgO : 7.0 SiO2) dopados com Nd2O3, Er2O3 ou Yb2O3, e verificar qual a influência desses íons nas propriedades ópticas, térmicas, mecânicas e termo-ópticas. Investigou-se também qual a influência da atmosfera de fusão. Com esse objetivo as amostras foram fundidas em cadinhos de grafite sob vácuo, e em cadinhos de platina, ao ar, ambas as fusões ocorreram a 1400 °C. As amostras foram investigadas através de difração de raios-X e microscopia óptica, cujos resultados confirmaram o estado amorfo das amostras preparadas. As amostras não apresentaram estrias e tiveram boa transparência óptica. Os espectros de transmitância mostraram que o processo de fusão a vácuo eliminou completamente a forte banda de absorção próxima a 3 ?m devida a água. O corte da transmitância na região do infravermelho ocorreu em 5.5 ?m, sendo independente do tipo do íon terra rara presente na composição do vidro. O índice de refração em 546.1 nm aumentou de 1.6702 (amostra base) para 1.6876 (amostra dopada com 8% de Er2O3). Este acréscimo no índice de refração é atribuído a um aumento da polarizabilidade eletrônica do vidro devido ao aumento de oxigênios nonbridging. A densidade aumenta de 2.92 g/cm3 (amostra base) para 3.12 g/cm3 (amostra dopada com 8% de Er2O3), esse aumento é explicado levando em consideração a massa dos átomos terras raras, que são maiores em relação ao Al2O3. A dureza dos vidros aluminato de cálcio diminuiu de 865 kg/mm2 (amostra base) para 781 kg/mm2 (amostra dopada com 8% de Er2O3), ou seja aproximadamente 11% de decréscimo. No caso da temperatura de transição vítrea, Tg, esse decréscimo é de aproximadamente 8%, sendo 841 °C para a amostra base e 782 °C para a amostra dopada com 8% de Er2O3. Para o vidro base, a difusividade térmica foi de 5.75 x 10-3 cm2/s e a condutividade térmica foi de 15.5 x 10-3 cm-1 K-1. Tanto a difusividade quanto a condutividade térmica decresceram na mesma proporção da dureza e Tg, conforme substitui-se a alumina pelo óxido terra rara. Esta é uma indicação de que os átomos terras raras atuam como modificadores de rede, abrindo a estrutura do vidro, diminuindo a resistência mecânica e atuando como barreiras térmicas no material. A resistência ao choque térmico dos vidros aluminato de cálcio é de 339 W/m, semelhante aos vidros silicatos que é de 358 W/m, e aproximadamente quatro vezes maior que a dos vidros fluoretos, 86 W/m. Este resultado confirma a hipótese de que os vidros aluminato de cálcio podem suportar variações abruptas de temperatura. Através da espectroscopia de lente térmica foram obtidas a eficiência quântica dos vidros aluminato de cálcio dopados com Nd2O3 e Er2O3. No caso das amostras dopadas com concentrações menores de 3% de Nd2O3 a eficiência quântica foi de aproximadamente 80%. Esses resultados indicam que os vidros aluminato de cálcio são excelentes candidatos para laseres de estado sólido e demais aplicações ópticas na região do infravermelho médio. / The development of compact solid-state lasers operating in the midinfrared wavelength region (2 -5 ?m) has been an area of considerable activity in the last few years. These devices offer great potential as light sources for applications as medical lasers as well as in remote chemical sensing devices. Light sources in the 2.8?m region are of particular interest for medical applications due to the strong water absorption in this spectral region. Apart from allowing extremely precise cutting and ablation of water-containing tissues, the other advantages of using light sources operating at 2.8 ?m are related to the possibilities of reducing skin burning in surgeries, decrease in the use of anesthesia and shortening of recovery time, especially in skin surgeries and in the cutting and remova1 of hard tissues, such as tooth enamel and bone. In order to achieve strong laser emission around 2.8 ?m the effort so far has been concentrated on the family of Er3+ doped non -oxide glasses such as heavy metal fluorides and chalcogenides. However the production of these glasses is expensive, and it is difficult to make them, besides they are toxic. On the other hand, the oxide glasses are cheaper, atoxic and easy to produce them. The disadvantaged, however, is its the relative high phonon energy that promote high nonradiative transition rates. Since calcium aluminate glasses are formed with non-network forms, CaO and Al2O3, they have high tendence towards devitrification. The addition of small amounts of alkali and alkaline earth elements enlarges the glass forming region. Several calcium aluminate glasses compostions containing SiO2, BaO and MgO are now reported in the literature. In this thesis, low silica calcium aluminosilicate glasses doped with Nd2O3 and Er2O3 were prepared. Since the sample compositions were close to the phase diagram glass formation, the rare earth doping was performed up to 8wt.%. The samples was melted under vacuum condition in a graphite crucible at 1500 °C, and in air in a platinum crucible. The influence of the rare earth doping on the thermal diffusivity, thermal conductivity and Vickers hardness was such that all these physical parameters decreased by roughly the same amount, namely 8%, between the undoped and 5 wt% of Nd2O3. The dependence of these parameters, as a function of the Nd2O3 doping, strongly supports the idea that the Nd3+ or Er3+ act as network modifiers. Elastic module (E, G, K, v) of calcium aluminosilicate glasses with < 10 mole% of SiO2 doped with Er2O3 and Yb2O3, melted in air and under vacuum conditions, have been measured using the pulse echo ultrasonic technique. There was a decrease of the elastic properties, about 5%, as rare earth doping increases from 0.2 to 1.5-mol% (about 8 wt%). The Young\'s modulus did not vary within errors of measurements. The Debye temperature varied between (369±9)K and 352±9 K, which is explained assuming that the rare earth ions acts as network modifiers disrupting the glasses structure. The undoped calcium aluminate glasses fracture toughness is (1.4±0.3) MPa m1/2 and the thermal shock resistance is (339±102) W/m. The fluorescence quantum efficiency determined by thermal lens spectroscopy, was found be about 80% for the 2wt% Nd2O3 doped calcium aluminosilicate glass. The fluorescence quenching was observed to doping higher than 2wt% Nd2O3. The variation of the refractive index as a function of the temperature, dn/dT, was found be 8.0 x 10-6/0c. Among the various glass system investigated, CA glasses presented greater mechanical properties and larger thermal shock resistance, indicating that these materials are candidates for solid state laser applications and other infrared applications.

Fe-based bulk metallic glasses (BMGs) have gained considerable interest due to their excellent soft magnetic properties with high saturation magnetization, high electrical resistivity, very good corrosion resistance, low materials cost, extremely high mechanical strength and hardness. In spite of having excellent strength, Fe-based BMGs are not used as structural materials in service, so far. The major obstacle is their inherent brittleness under mechanical loading, once a crack is developed the material fails catastrophically. Owing to the ever growing industrial demand for the materials with outstanding properties, aside from exploring new alloy compositions, it is pertinent to understand why or why-not the existing system work and how to improve their properties. Recent reports suggested that the plastic deformability can be enhanced by introducing different microstructural heterogeneities such as free volume enhanced regions, separated phases, nano-crystals, atomic clusters caused by for instance additions of small amount of soft elements. Understanding the effect of addition of soft elements to Fe-based BMGs on thermal stability, structural evolution, magnetic and mechanical properties are the main point which this work addresses. In this work, a study on two different soft ferromagnetic Fe-based glass forming alloys are presented, both of them known to have very high mechanical strength and excellent soft magnetic properties but so far have not been used in any industrial applications. The important issue is with the brittle behavior of this BMGs, particularly under mechanical loading. In each glass forming alloys, the aim was to find out the optimum quantity of the soft elements (Cu and Ga), which can be added to improve their room temperature plastic deformability without affecting the glass forming ability (GFA) and soft magnetic properties. The first glass forming alloy that is studied is Fe36Co36B19.2Si4.8Nb4. This glass forming alloy is highly sensitive to the impurities, only pure elements were used to form this alloy. The addition of only 0.5 at.% Cu completely changes the thermal stability and structural evolution but it also improves the mechanical properties. In case of Ga addition up to 1.5 at.% the crystallization behavior remains unaltered and the thermal stability improves marginally. The addition of Ga improves the plastic deformability of the glass by forming soft zones, whose melting point is much lower compared to rest of the alloy. These soft zones are responsible for the plastic deformation of this glass. Thus addition of Ga is very beneficial in improving the mechanical properties of this Fe-based BMG. In the second part, Fe74Mo4P10C7.5B2.5Si2 glass forming alloy is studied. Unlike the aforementioned alloy, this glass forming alloy is not very sensitive to the impurities, industrial grade alloy elements can also be used to form this alloy. In this alloy addition of Cu is beneficial only up to 0.5 at.%, beyond that Cu addition deteriorates GFA and magnetic properties. In case of Ga addition up to 2 at.% the crystallization behavior remains unaltered and the thermal stability improves marginally. Similar to the FeCoBSiNb glass, the addition of Ga in FeMoPCBSi glass also improves the plastic deformability of the glass by formation of soft zones. Addition of small at.% Ga proved be an viable solution to improve the plastic deformability in the ferromagnetic Fe-based metallic glasses without compromising on thermal and magnetic properties of the glass. In the final part we tried to cast the Fe74Mo4P10C7.5B2.5Si2 glass in a complex shape using an industrial high pressure die casting (HPDC) set up. The important issues were with the casting alloy temperature, casting speed and die material. The aim of our work was to optimize the die material suitable for casting the BMGs and then address the issues with casting temperature and casting speed. We have thus attempted to gain a basic knowledge in casting the Fe-based BMG in industrial scale. Our effort was tremendously successful, we were able to produce fully amorphous complex shaped samples with excellent surface finish. We have thus made a considerable advancement towards understanding the basics behind improving the room temperature plastic deformability in Fe36Co36B19.2Si4.8Nb4 and Fe74Mo4P10C7.5B2.5Si2 ferromagnetic BMGs. We have also made a considerable progress in industrialization of bulk ferromagnetic BMGs.

Este trabalho apresenta um estudo dos mecanismos de transporte iônico nos vidros fluorsilicatos de cádmio e chumbo de composição 40SiO2 40PbF2 20CdF2, e nos vidros boratos contendo LiF de composição 50B2O3 10PbO 40LiF. Estes materiais são importantes pela sua potencial utilização em dispositivos ópticos e eletrólitos sólidos. No vidro borato 50B2O3 10PbO 40LiF o estudo da forma de linha do 7Li mostrou que esta é influenciada tanto por interações dipolares quanto por quadrupolares. O estudo de RMN revelou que há dois F- presentes neste vidro, um deles em vizinhaças de Pb (F- incorporados à rede vítrea substituindo o oxigênio do grupo PbO), e o outro em vizinhanças de Li. A forma de linha de RMN dependente da temperatura para o lítio e para o flúor, e seus tempos de relaxação, exibem as características qualitativas associadas com a alta mobilidade do 7Li e do 19F neste sistema. Este estudo também mostrou que, neste vidro, tanto o Li+ como o F- contribuem para a condutividade medida, sendo que o 7Li é móvel a temperaturas mais baixas (a partir de 250 K), e o 19F começa a se mover em temperaturas mais altas (a partir de 400 K). No vidro 40SiO2 40PbF2 20CdF2, os resultados de RMN mostraram a alta mobilidade do flúor e evidenciaram duas dinâmicas diferentes dos íons flúor. Os dados da relaxação do flúor revelaram um máximo da taxa de relaxação spin-rede abaixo da temperatura de transição vítrea (Tg), indicando que a mobilidade do flúor, neste vidro, é comparável àquelas encontradas em condutores iônicos rápidos / This work presents a study of the ionic transport mechanisms in lead-cadmium fluorosilicate glasses, of composition 40SiO2 40PbF2 20CdF2, and in borate glasses containing LiF, of composition 50B2O3 10PbO 40LiF. These materiais are important due to theirs high potential applicability in optic devices and in solid electrolytes. In the borate glass 50B2O3 10PbO 40LiF, the line shape study of 7Li shows an influence of the dipolar and quadrupolar interactions. The NMR results showed that there are two kinds of F- ions in this glass, one in the Pb vicinity (F- in the glass lattice, in substitution of the PbO oxygen), and the other in the Li vicinity. The NMR line shape depends on the temperature for the 7Li and 19F atoms, and their relaxation times reflect qualitative features related to the high mobility of there nuclei. Also, this study shows that, in this glass, both, 7Li and 19F, play an important role in the electric conductivity. The 7Li is mobile for low temperatures (from 250 K), while the 19F is mobile for high temperatures (from 400 K). In the 40SiO2 40PbF2 20CdF2 glass, the NMR results showed the high mobility of the fluorine ions, indicating two different dynamics of those nuclei. The relaxation data of the 19F presented a spin-lattice relaxation rate maximum below the glass transition temperature (Tg, indicating that the 19F mobility in this glass is comparable to that of rapid ionic conducting glasses

Bioactive glasses are a class of synthetic inorganic material that have wide orthopedics, dentistry, tissue engineering and other biomedical applications. The origin of the bioactivity is closely related to the atomic structures of these novel glass materials, which otherwise lack long range order and defies any direct experimental measurements due to their amorphous nature. The structure of bioactive glasses is thus essential for the understanding of bioactive behaviors and eventually rational design of glass compositions. In this dissertation, molecular dynamics (MD) and reverse monte carlo (RMC) based computer simulations have been used to systematically study the atomic structure of three classes of new bioactive glasses: strontium doped 45S5 Bioglass®, ZnO-SrO containing bioactive glasses, and Cao-MgO-P2O5-SiO2 bioactive glasses. Properties such as ionic diffusion that are important to glass dissolution behaviors are also examined as a function of glass compositions. The accuracy of structure model generated by simulation was validated by comparing with various experimental measurements including X-ray/neutron diffraction, NMR and Raman spectroscopy. It is shown in this dissertation that atomistic computer simulations, when integrated with structural and property characterizations, is an effective tool in understanding the structural origin of bioactivity and other properties of amorphous bioactive materials that can lead to design of novel materials for biomedical applications.

Interest in Raman amplification has undergone a revival due to the rapidly increasing bandwidth requirements for communications transmission, both for long haul and local area networks, and recent developments in the telecom fiber industry and diode laser technology. In contrast to rare earth doped fiber amplifiers, for which the range of wavelengths is fixed and limited, Raman gain bandwidths are larger and the operating wavelength is fixed only by the pump wavelength and the bandwidth of the Raman active medium. In this context, glasses are the material of choice for this application due to their relatively broad spectral response, and ability of making them into optical fiber. This dissertation summarizes findings on different oxide-based glasses that have been synthesized and characterized for their potential application as Raman gain media. Two main glass families were investigated: phosphate-based glass matrices for broadband Raman gain application and TeO2-based glasses for high Raman gain amplification. A phosphate network was preferred for the broadband application since the phosphate Raman active modes can provide amplification above 1000 cm-1, whilst TeO2-based glasses were selected for the high gain application due to their enhanced nonlinearities and polarizabilities among the other oxide-based network formers. The results summarized in this dissertation show that phosphate-based glasses can provide Raman amplification bandwidths of up to 40 THz, an improvement of almost 5 times the bandwidth of SiO2. On the other hand, tellurite-based glasses appear to be promising candidates for high gain discrete Raman applications, providing peak Raman gain coefficients of up to 50 times higher than SiO2, at 1064 nm. Although, visible spontaneous Raman scattering cross-section measurement is the most frequently used tool for estimating the strength and spectral distribution of Raman gain in materials, especially glasses, there are some issues that one needs to be aware when conducting these measurements near the absorption band edge of the material. This led to the detection of an inherent frequency-dispersion in the Raman susceptibility and a resonant enhancement phenomenon when measurements were conducted near the absorption edge of the material.

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