Abstract

The nonlinear-optical behavior of metall nanoclusters embedded in dielectric materials have attractive properties for applications in optical devices. This paper describes the fabrication of silver particles in polymer substrate. A metal/polymer class of materials, produced by ion synthesis of metal nanoparticles in the organic matrix, has been studied from the point of view of formation mechanisms of dispersions, microstructure and optical properties Some preliminary investigations of silver/epoxy composites formed by ion implantation were presented early¹. Now metal dispersions were produced by high-dose implantation of silver ions in epoxy at the different stages of polymerization process and were thus depend on metal concentration and polymer viscosity ratio The composites were characterized by transmission electron microscopy, image analysis and linear optical absorption at room temperature The average particle size can be controlled by the properties of the organic substrate, concentration of the metal and processing The silver dispersions give rise to optical absorption at the plasmon wavelength in the visible spectra and maximum of absorption is correlated with filling factor and size of particles. It is shown that 5-20 nm spherical silver particles with narrow log-normal size distribution have taken in near-surface region of viscous epoxy. It was observed the considerable increasing of size distribution width of synthesized particles at change of viscosity of substrate from similar liquid to solid state. Structure of granular silver films were be saving a constant at different quantity of dispersed metal in glass polymer.

© 1996 IEEE