INTRA-STARK RELAXATION OF ND3+ IN SILICATE GLASS - SUBPICOSECOND ACCUMULATED PHOTON-ECHO EXPERIMENTS

We have directly measured in the time domain the rates of phonon-induced population relaxation within the 4G 5 2, 2G 7 2 Stark manifold of Nd3+ in a silicate glass. At 13 K, these processes occur in the picosecond to subpicosecond time regime. The population relaxation time increases with excitation frequency within each inhomogeneously broadened Stark component. Finally, the location of the Stark components within the entire inhomogeneous profile can be inferred from the data. © 1990.