Abstract
The silver photodoping effect in amorphous AsGeSeS chalcogenide thin films for holographic recording has been investigated using a HeNe laser ($\lambda$=632.8 nm). The chalcogenide films prepared in this work were thinner in comparison with the penetration depth of recording light ($d_p$=1.66 mm). The variation of the diffraction efficiency $(\eta)$ in amorphous chalcogende films exhibits a tendency, independently of the Ag photodoping. That is, n increases relatively rapidly at the beginning of the recording process, reaches the maximum $({\eta}_{max})$ and slowly decreases. In addition, the value of ${\eta}_{max}$ depends strongly on chalcogenide film thickness(d) and its peak among the films with d = 40, 80, 150, 300, and 633 nm is observed at d = 150 nm (approximately 1/2n), where n is refractive index of the chalcogenide (n=2.0). The ${\eta}$ is largely enhanced by Ag photodoping into the chalcogenides. In particular, the value of hmax in a bilayer of 10-nm-thick Ag/150-nm-thick AsGeSeS film is about 1.6%, which corresponds to ~20 times in comparison with that of the AsGeSeS film (without Ag).
