BaO–P2O5 (BP) glasses with high BaO concentration (⩾50 mol%) have characteristics of low photoelastic constant [1], high solubility of active ions [2] and good water durability among phosphate glasses. Thermal stability of BP glasses is poor due to surface crystallization [3]. However, the stability against crystallization improves significantly by B2O3 addition with ⩾3 mol% for bulk samples [3] and with ⩾7 mol% for powdered forms [4]. Therefore, the barium borophosphate glasses doped with active ions such as transition metal and rare-earth ions are attractive for new optical filters [5] and [6] and short-length, high-power fiber lasers [2].
In this work BaO–B2O3–P2O5 glasses containing CuO were prepared by melt-quenching. The dependences of CuO concentration on thermal properties and optical properties are studied in CuO–BaO–B2O3–P2O5 (CBBP) glasses.