Spontaneous oxygen loading into SiO2 glass by thermal anneal

The interstitial oxygen molecules (O 2 ) in SiO 2 glass were detected down to ∼10 15 cm -3 by photoluminescence of O 2 at 1272nm excited at 765nm by a continuous-wave titanium sapphire laser. It was evidenced that SiO 2 glass thermally annealed in air between 800 and 1100°C spontaneously absorbs ∼10 16 cm -3 of O 2 from the ambient atmosphere. The time-dependent concentration change of the interstitial O 2 allows the determination of both the diffusion coefficient and the solubility of the interstitial O 2 .