AN INVESTIGATION OF ANALOG OPTICAL STORAGE THROUGH PHOTOCHEMICAL HOLE-BURNING.
Paul Atcheson
Abstract
We have examined the technique of persistent spectral holeburning as a method for analog optical data storage. Two types of materials were examined from a theoretical standpoint, ones which exhibit photochemical holeburning (PHB) and ones which exhibit nonphotochemical holeburning (NPHB). We have presented the conditions under which a PHB material shows a linear relation between hole depth and exposure intensity or exposure time. Also we show that a NPHB material has no such condition. We conclude that a PHB material may be useful for analog optical data storage, while a NPHB material would not. Experiments were conducted with a NPHB material, R' color centers in LiF, to support the NPHB analysis.