Study on the protection of Er-doped phosphate glass waveguide surface in ion-exchange processing

A novel method, sputtering K9 glass film, is proposed to solve the surface corrosion of Er-doped phosphate glass during ion-exchange processing for optical waveguide fabrication. The corrosion causes are analyzed to be the intrinsically weak stabilization of phosphate glass structure, hydrophile and weakly acidic property of phosphate radical. Experimental results show that the K9 glass film could not only protect the Er-doped phosphate glass surface from being corroded but also give no influence on the waveguide fabrication. The effect of thickness of K9 glass film on the optical property of waveguide is also investigated and the optimal thickness is found to be 60-80 nm. It provides a good base for further fabrication of active phosphate glass optical waveguide devices.