Isothermal relaxation of induced absorption of glasses after exposure to ionizing radiation

This paper reports a technique and presents the main results of experiments on the relaxation of glasses at room temperature 10(-3)-10(6) sec after exposure to steady-state gamma and pulsed gamma-neutron radiation of various doses. The resulting spectral and relaxation characteristics of twenty-two kinds of commercial glasses and the evaluation of how a light pulse affects the residual darkening can be used as reference data for predicting the effect of ionizing radiation on optics. (C) 2001 The Optical Society of America.