Preparation and third-order optical nonlinearity of glass ceramics based on GeS2–Ga2S3–CsCl pseudo-ternary system

Chalcohalide glass-ceramics based on GeS2–Ga2S3–CsCl pseudo-ternary system were prepared by heat treatment method. X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscope studies confirmed the formations of Ga2S3 and GeS2 phase grains with sizes of 2–5 and 80 nm, respectively. Z-scan technology was employed to investigate the third-order nonlinear optical characteristics of both precursor glass and its glass ceramics at 800 nm. The results show that nonlinear refractive index n2 as well as nonlinear absorption coefficient β increase after heat treatment, which is due to quantum effects, and the largest n2 of the glass ceramics is 4.3 × 10− 11 esu which is 4 times larger than that of the host.