Th. doct.-ing.--Méc. non linéaire et chronométrie--Besançon, 1980. N°: 107.

Th. doct.-ing.--Besançon, 1980. N°: 105.

Th. 3e cycle--Chim. struct.--Besançon, 1982. N°: 398.

Th. 3ecycle--Méthodes d'approximation et algorithmes en anal. et théor. des nombres--Besançon, 1980. N°: 333.

Th. doct.-ing.--Besançon, 1978. N°: 86.

Th. doct.-ing.--Besançon, 1978. N°: 82.

Th. 3e cycle--Phys.--Besançon, 1978. N°: 288.

Quartz is one of the most abundant natural minerals in the crust of the earth. Due to its dosimetric luminescence properties, it is employed in retrospective dosimetry, archaeological and geological dating. The intensity and the structure of the TL glow curves of quartz are strongly dependent upon the origin, impurity content, formation condition and pre-irradiation heat treatment. The aim of this project is to study the mechanisms of thermoluminescence (TL), Phototranssferred thermoluminescence (PTTL) and radioluminescence (RL) in synthetic quartz and to discuss the results in terms of physical characteristics of point defects involved. Thermoluminescence measurements were made on a sample of synthetic quartz in its as-received state (unannealed) synthetic quartz annealed at 500˚C for 10 minutes. The unannealed sample shows six TL glow peaks located at 94, 116, 176, 212, 280 and 348˚C at a heating rate of 5˚Cs⁻¹. The annealed sample shows seven TL peaks at 115, 148, 214, 246, 300, 348 and 412˚C at a heating rate of 5˚Cs⁻¹. The intensity of peak I, at 94 and 115˚C for the unannealed and annealed samples respectively, increases with irradiation. Peak I has an activation energy of approximately 0.90 eV and a frequency factor of the order of 10¹¹ s⁻¹. The order of kinetics is between 0.9 and 1.2. The unannealed synthetic quartz shows phototransferred thermoluminescence (PTTL) at the position of peak I after removal of the first three peaks followed by illumination. The PTTL intensities show peak shaped behaviour when plotted against illumination time. The PTTL showed a quadratic increase with dose. The material exhibits fading of PTTL intensity with delay time. Radioluminescence was measured on synthetic quartz unannealed and annealed annealed at 500, 600, 700, 800, 900 and 1000˚C for 10 to 60 min. The emission spectra of synthetic quartz show seven emission bands. The effect of irradiation on the RL spectra is to increase the intensity of all emission bands for samples annealed at temperatures less than or equal to 700˚C. The effect of annealing time is to increase the RL amplitude for the samples annealed at temperatures greater than 700˚C. The annealing temperature increases the RL amplitude of all emission bands of the spectrum for all samples.

The kinetic and dosimetric features of the main thermoluminescence peak of quartz have been investigated in unannealed as well in quartz annealed at 500˚C for 10 minutes. The main peak is found at 92 and 86˚C respectively for aliquots of unannealed and annealed samples irradiated to 10 Gy and heated at 5.0˚C/s. For each sample, the intensity of the main peak is enhanced with repetitive measurement whereas its maximum temperature is unaffected. The peak position of the main peak in each sample is independent of the irradiation dose and this, together with its fading characteristics are consistent with first-order kinetics. For low doses, typically between 2 and 10 Gy, the dose response of the main peak in each sample is linear. In the intermediate dose range from 10 to 60 Gy, the growth of the main peak in each sample is sub-linear and for greater doses, in the range from 60 Gy to 151 Gy, it is linear again. The half-life of the main peak of the unannealed sample is about 1.3 h whereas that of the annealed sample is about 1.2 h. The main peak in each sample can be approximated to a first-order glow peak. As the heating rate increases, the intensity of the main peak in each sample decreases. This is evidence of thermal quenching. The main peak in each sample is the only peak regenerated by phototransfer. The resulting phototransferred peak occurs at the same temperature as the original peak and has similar kinetic and dosimetric features. For a preheat temperature of 120˚C, the intensity of the phototransferred peak in each sample increases with illumination time up to a maximum and decreases afterwards. At longer illumination times (such as 30 min up to 1 h), no further decrease in the intensity of the phototransferred peak is observed. The traps associated with the 325˚C peak are the main source of the electrons responsible for the regenerated peak. Radioluminescence emission spectra were also measured for quartz annealed at various temperatures. Emission bands in quartz are affected by annealing and irradiation. A strong enhancement of the 3.4 eV (~366 nm) emission band is observed in quartz annealed at 500˚C. A new emission band which grows with annealing up to 1000˚C is observed at 3.7 eV (~330 nm) for quartz annealed at 600˚C. An attempt has been made to correlate the changes in radioluminescence emission spectra due to annealing with the influence of annealing on luminescence lifetimes in quartz.

The formation and propagation of laser-driven shock waves has been observed by optical shadowgraphy in fused quartz, α-quartz and sodium chloride. Target materials were irradiated with a 0.53 µm , ~ 2.5 ns FWHM laser pulse at intensities ranging between 0.2 — 2 x 10¹³ W/cm², producing peak pressures varying from 0.3 — 3 Mbar at the shock front. Observations in both varieties of quartz reveal transient, high-speed shock propagation followed by deceleration towards a steady asymptotic shock speed. Similar high-speed transients were not seen in sodium chloride. The results in quartz were found to be in significant disagreement with both one-dimensional and two-dimensional hydrodynamic calculations based on equilibrium equations of state. The non-steady shock propagation is interpreted as being due to a relaxation process in the phase transformation of quartz into the high-pressure stishovite phase which occurs at the shock front. The effects of such a relaxation process on the shock dynamics and shock compression process are considered for the case of a direct relaxation from quartz into stishovite, as well as for an indirect relaxation process in which the -transformation of quartz into stishovite is preceded by shock-induced amorphization of the quartz. It is shown that either scenario would result in higher shock speeds and less compressible shock states than those obtained under equilibrium conditions. / Science, Faculty of / Physics and Astronomy, Department of / Graduate