Study of damage processes of silica by in situ hydrogen-ion-induced luminescence measurements

We have performed in situ measurements of luminescence from high and low OH silica glasses and a silica single crystal under H+ irradiation. The luminescence spectra showed various emission bands assigned to intrinsic and irradiation-produced defects in silica. With increase of H+ fluence, the intensity of the 2.7 eV band first increased and then gradually decreased, and which were respectively attributed to production of the B2α oxygen deficient centers and their subsequent annihilation by defect clustering or Si precipitation. Such defect formation processes under H+ irradiation were influenced by the amount of intrinsic OH in silica glass, i.e., irradiation-produced defects were more stable in the high-OH silica glass compared with the low-OH silica glass. The detailed analyses of the luminescence of silica single crystal indicated that the defect formation process after some amorphization of silica crystal is fundamentally the same as that in the low-OH silica glass.