Electrical, dielectric and structural properties of borovanadate glass systems doped with samarium oxide

Glasses doped with rare earth (RE) ions are widely studied due to the numerous applications of these systems (active media for solid state lasers, optical telecommunication, non-linear optical materials, electro-optic devices, etc.). Boron trioxide, B2O3, is a known glass forming oxide with a relative low melting temperature. The addition of a transition metal oxide, such as V2O5, promotes the exhibition of semiconducting properties making these promising systems for several technological applications, such that ones involved in solar energy conversion devices. It is known that alkali borovanadate glasses, like alkali borate glasses themselves, are ionically conducting materials. Despite their importance there are only few studies on these glasses reported on literature. Thus, the alkali-borovanadate glass system constitutes a family with high interest from the electrical and dielectric point of view. The effect of the increment of alkali quantity in the electrical and dielectric response of these glasses and the physical/structural explanation are questions which will be addressed. In this work, the transparent glass samples with molar composition 0.01Sm(2)O(3)-0.99[0.85B(2)O(3)-(0.15-x)Li2O-xV(2)O(5)] with x = 0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.35, 0.5 and 2 (mol%) were prepared by conventional melting technique. The prepared samples were fully characterized using different experimental techniques such as, differential thermal analysis (DTA), X-ray diffraction (XRD), electrical and dielectric measurements. The samples structure, electrical and dielectric properties as a function of vanadium ions content was explored and discussed. (C) 2011 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim