Investigation of the Mechanisms Involved in the Sintering of Chalcogenide Glasses and the Preparation of Glass-Ceramics by Spark Plasma Sintering

The sintering of the 80GeSe2–20Ga2Se3 chalcogenide glass composition as well as the preparation of the corresponding glass‐ceramics has been investigated using pulsed current electrical sintering also known as spark plasma sintering. Amorphous powder has been synthesized by mechanical alloying. Due to the electrical insulating property of this glass composition, powder is heated mostly through the heating of the graphite die. It was found that densification of glass powder occurs through a viscous flow mechanism prior to devitrification. A model has been successfully applied to determine the viscosity and activation energy of the glass. This model has been confirmed by ball penetration technique to determine the glass sample viscosity.