Kuwait University

College of Engineering and Petroleum

ME341 MATERIALS SCIENCE & METALLURGY II
MODULE 10: OPTICAL PROPERTIES
Prof. Khaled Al-Fadhalah
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 Optical Properties: Overview
• Objective: to explore the optical properties of materials, looking at materials responses to
the application of light.
• Optical property: material’s response to exposure to electromagnetic radiation in visible light.
• Applications: domestic, medicine, astronomy, manufacturing, etc.
• Issues to address……
– What phenomena occur when light is shined on a material?
• Nature of electromagnetic radiation and its interactions with solid materials
– What determines the characteristic colors of materials?
– Why are some materials transparent and others translucent or opaque?
• Optical behaviors of metallic and nonmetallic materials in terms of absorption, reflection, and
transmission characteristics.
– How optical characteristics have been utilized?
• Luminescence, photoconductivity, and light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation (laser)
• Optical fibers in communications.
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 Optical Properties: Overview
• Electromagnetic radiation is considered to be wave-like, consisting of electric and magnetic field
components that are perpendicular to each other.
• Forms of electromagnetic radiation: Light, heat, radar, radio waves, and x-rays.
• Electromagnetic spectrum of radiation spans the wide range from γ-rays with wavelength as 10-12 m,
through x-rays, ultraviolet, visible, infrared, and finally radio waves with wavelengths as along as 105 m.
• Visible light: wavelengths ranging from 0.39 to 0.77 μm.
Photon electromagnetic wave
spectrum of
electromagnetic
radiation
e = electric field
H = magnetic field H components
l = wavelength
• Electric field component of the wave
interacts with electrons electrostatically
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 Optical Properties: Overview
• Light is an electromagnetic waves and consisting of particles called photons.
• Photon is a quantum unit of light having energy E and velocity c:
hc
E  h  and c  l
l
E  energy of a photon (units of Joule)
l  wavelength of radiation (units of meter)
  frequency of radiation (units of hertz “1 Hz = 1 cycle per second”)
h  Planck’ s constant (6.62 x 10 34 J  s)
All electromagnetic radiation
c  speed of light in a vacuum  1 e 0  0  3.00 x 108 m/s traverses a vacuum at same velocity
e 0  electric permittivity of a vacuum
 0  magnetic permeability of a vacuum
White light
is simply a
mixture of
all colors
Electromagnetic
Spectrum
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 Light Interactions with Solids
• Interaction of photons (light) with the electronic or crystal structure of a material leads to a
number of phenomena:
– Absorption: photons may give their energy to the material.
– Reflection: photons of identical energy are immediately emitted by the material.
– Transmission: photons may not interact with the material structure.
– Refraction: during transmission photons changes its velocity and direction.
• At any instance of light interaction with a material, the total intensity of incident light striking a
surface (I0) is equal to sum of the absorbed, reflected, and transmitted intensities:
I 0  IT  I A  I R OR T  A R
where: T  IT I 0
A  I A I0
R  IR I0
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 Light Interactions with Solids
• Materials are classified on the basis of their interaction with visible light in to three categories:
1.Transparent materials: capable of transmitting light with relatively little absorption and reflection
(can see through them)
2.Translucent materials: those through which light is transmitted diffusely (light is scattered within the
interior, to the degree that objects are not clearly distinguishable when viewed through a specimen)
3.Opaque materials: those through which transmission of visible light is not possible (absorb all the
energy from the light photons)
Transparent Translucent Opaque
single polycrystalline polycrystalline
crystal dense porous
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 Optical Properties of Metals
• Metals are generally opaque to visible light  only absorption and reflection
• Metals are, however, transparent to high end frequencies (x-rays and γ-rays).
• Metals consist partially filled high-energy conduction bands; when photons are directed at their surfaces,
photon energy excites electrons into unoccupied states above Fermi energy
• Total absorption occurs at very thin outer layer in metals. Consequently, metals are opaque to visible light
and highly reflective (only metallic films thinner than 0.1 μm are capable of transmitting visible light)
• Absorbed radiation is re-emitted from metallic surface in form of visible light of same wave length as reflected light.
• Reflectivity (R) of metals is 0.90 to 0.95 (remaining energy is dissipated as heat)
• The perceived color is determined by the wavelength of the reflected light.
Photon Absorption Photon Reemission
Electron transition
from an excited state
produces a photon
Cu & Au: some of the energy associated
with light photons having short wavelengths is not
reemitted as visible light
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 Optical Properties of Non-Metals
Refraction:
• Similar to speed in vacuum, speed of light (v) in a
material can be related to its electrical and magnetic
properties (ɛ = permittivity, μ = permeability) as:
v 1 e
• The index of refraction can be expressed as:
c e
n   e r r
v e 0 0
ɛr = relative permittivity “dielectric constant”
μr = relative magnetic permeability
• Since most materials are only
slightly magnetic (μr ≈ 1):
n  er
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 Optical Properties of Non-Metals
Refraction:
Snell’s Law:
refracted
ϕ1 = incident angle, ϕ2 = refracted angle
incident
ϕc = critical angle (ϕc occurs when ϕ2 = 90°)
• For ϕ1 > ϕc light is internally reflected
Example: Fiber optic cables are clad in low n
material so that light will experience total internal
reflectance and not escape from the optical fiber.
Example: Diamond in Air
• Find critical angle ϕc for light passing from diamond (n1 = 2.41) into air (n2 = 1)?
• Solution: At the critical angle, 1 c and
Use Snell’s law: Rearrange:
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 Optical Properties of Non-Metals
Reflection:
• Reflectivity (R): fraction of light reflected (scattered) at the interface.
R  IR I0 I0, lR = intensity of incident & reflected beams
• If the incident light is normal to the interface:
2
 n n 
R   2 1  n1, n2 = indices of refraction of the two media
 n2  n1 
• When light is transmitted from a vacuum or air (nv or nair = 1) into a solid (ns):
2
 n 1 
R   s 

 ns  1 
• Example (Dimond in air): ndiamond = 2.41  R = 0.17 (17%)
• Materials with a high ns have a higher reflectivity than materials with a low ns.
• In metals (opaque), the reflectivity is typically in the range of 0.90-0.95, where
as for glasses it is close to 0.05.
• High R: desired in applications such as mirrors (coatings on glasses)
• Low R: desired in lenses & optical devices (use of MgF2 coating on lenses)
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 Optical Properties of Non-Metals
Absorption:
• Nonmetallic materials may be opaque or transparent to visible light.
• If transparent, they often appear colored.
• Light radiation is absorbed in nonmetallic materials by two basic mechanisms:
1. Electronic polarization (process of electric dipole alignment with the electric field)
2. Electron transition from valence band to conduction band
• In case 2, absorption of photon of light may occur by promotion or excitation of an electron across
the band gap, leaving behind a hole in the valence band.
• The energy of photon absorbed ΔE (i.e. hv) should be greater than band gap energy Eg
• The absorbed electromagnetic energy ΔE must be dissipated. One way of dissipation is via direct
electron and hole recombination (electron + hole  ΔE)
• The intensity of non-absorbed (transmitted) radiation
is calculated using Beers Law:
β = absorption coefficient, mm-1
 = sample thickness, mm
I 0 = incident light intensity
IT = transmitted light intensity
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 Example: Absorption:
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 Optical Properties of Non-Metals
Absorption in Semiconductors:
• Absorption of light of frequency ν by electron transition occurs if hν > Egap
• Three possibilities:
– If Egap < 1.8 eV, all light absorbed; material is opaque (e.g., Si, GaAs)
– If Egap > 3.1 eV, no light absorption; material is transparent and colorless (e.g., diamond)
– If 1.8 eV < Egap < 3.1 eV, partial light absorption; material is colored
• Examples of photon energies:
– Blue light: hc/λblue = 3.1 eV
– Red light: hc/λred = 1.8 eV
Energy of electron
hc unfilled states
E  hv   Eg
l
incident photon
Example: Minimum Wavelength Absorbed in Ge energy hν
Egap
filled states
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 Optical Properties of Non-Metals
Transmission:
• Transmissivity (T): fraction of light beam that is not reflected nor absorbed, but rather it is transmitted
through the material.
• For an incident beam of intensity I0 impinging on the front surface of specimen, the transmitted intensity
at the back face IT (assuming same medium outside both front and back faces):
I T I 0 1 - R 2 e  l
β = absorption coefficient, mm-1 , l = sample thickness, mm
• R, A, and T depends on light wavelength
• Example: for light having a wavelength of 0.4 μm  T= 0.90, A= 0.05, and R = 0.05.
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 Optical Properties of Non-Metals
• Color is a result of the combination of wavelengths that are transmitted.
• If absorption is uniform for all visible wavelengths, material appears colorless.
• Transparent materials appear colored as a result of specific wavelength ranges of light that are
selectively absorbed by electron excitation.
• Selective absorption occurs in semiconducting materials that have band gaps within the range of
photon energies for visible light (1.8 to 3.1 eV)
• Color determined by the distribution of wavelengths (frequency):
 Transmitted light
 Re-emitted light from electron transitions (reemission frequency not always same as absorption)
• Example 1: Cadmium Sulfide (CdS)
 Has Eg = 2.4 eV & absorbs higher energy visible light (blue, violet)
 Color results from red/orange/yellow light transmitted (non-absorbed) with Eg = 1.8 & 2.4 eV
• Example 2: Ruby
80

Transmittance (%)
 Mixture of Sapphire (Al2O3) & Chromium oxide sapphire
(Cr2O) of concentration of 0.5-2 at% 70
 Sapphire is transparent & colorless (Eg >3.1 eV) ruby
 Adding Cr2O3 : 60
- Alters the band gap 50
- Blue & orange/yellow/green light is absorbed 40
- Red light is transmitted
0.3 0.5 0.7 0.9
- Result: Ruby is deep red in color wavelength,λ (μm)
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 Applications of Optical Phenomena
• Light interacts with a material in many ways.
• Depending on the material, its crystal structure,
microstructure, and characteristics of incident light,
Array of polycrystalline
there are many optical phenomena: silicon photovoltaic cell
1. Luminescence
2. Photoconductivity
3. Lasers
4. Optical fibers
• All these phenomena find quite many
applications in technology for daily life.
• Example: Photovoltaic Solar Cell
– Cell is made of polycrystalline silicon having p-n junction.
– Photons originate as sun might excites electrons on the
n-side
n-side and from holes on the p-side.
p-side
– Electrons and holes are drawn away from the junction in
opposite directions and become part of external current.
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