(205) 934-8088, mirov@uab.edu
Absorption Spectroscopy: Absorption spectroscopy is performed with a Shimadzu UV-VIS-NIR double beam spectrophotometer UV 3101PC and with a home-made cavity ring down spectrometer coupled to a broadly tunable (200-1200 nm) alexandrite-LiF:F2+ color center laser combination.
Fluorescence and Raman spectroscopies are centered around Janis Research Company CCS-450 closed cycle refrigerator system. Numerous pulsed and CW lasers can be configured for samples excitation. Among them a Spectra-Physics model GRC-230 injection seeded Nd:YAG laser with frequency doubling, tripling, and quadrupling coupled to two LightAge Raman shifters (H2 and D2), and tunable (1100-1250, 550-600, 280-300 nm) LiF:F2- color center laser “MALSAN”; Light Age Alexandrite Laser System PAL101 with variable temporal and spectral outputs coupled to home made LiF:F2+ color center laser (800-1200 nm) with frequency doubling, tripling, quadrupling and difference frequency generation (200-8000nm); Continuum PY61-10 high energy picosecond Nd:YAG; 500 Hz repetition rate 1 mJ diode pumped Nd:YAG laser “PULSAR 200” with a pulse duration of 1.5-2 ns with frequency doubling and tripling option. CW lasers include, SDL824 tunable diode laser, several home-made external cavity multiwavelength diode lasers, Er-fiber 1550 nm, 10W linearly polarized ELD laser (IPG Photonics), and several home made Er fiber laser pumped microchip and external cavity mid-IR (2-3µm) tunable lasers based on Cr2+:ZnS and ZnSe lasers. We are equipped with several spectrometers/spectrographs for measuring fluorescence, excitation, and Raman spectra and kinetics of fluorescence. Among them portable Ocean Optics R2000 fiber coupled Raman system and several Acton Research Corp. SpectraPro scanning monochromators/imaging spectrographs - (SpectraPro 750, 500, 150) with gratings covering UV (200 nm) – middle IR (14000nm) spectral range coupled to two Princeton Instruments ICCD. Other detectors include a numerous PMT’s, TE-cooled PbS and InGaAS detector for the 0.7 to 3 μm range, and a LN-cooled HgCdTe and fast InSb detectors for the 2 - 14 and 2-5 μm range, respectively. Data acquisition is performed with ARC NCL Spectral Management System, two Stanford Instrument boxcar-averagers and EGG Instruments 7265 lock-in amplifier interfaced with PC. Fast InSb detector has a sub-500 ns response time, and in conjunction with a digitizing oscilloscope or box-car system, can be used for luminescence lifetime measurements.
The Laser lab has extensive equipment for Z-scan and DFWM characterization of nonlinear optical materials. Spiricon LBA 100 beam profiler is available for beam diagnostics and Wavemeter W-4500 (Burleigh) system for wavelength measurements. The laser and nonlinear optics lab also has extensive miscellaneous equipment: eight Newport RC 2000 vibration isolated optical tables, a large variety of optical positioning equipment, and the optics, including mirrors, beam splitters, lenses, filters, microscope objectives, and polarizing optics.