Analysis of molecular oxygen formation in irradiated glasses: a Raman depth profile study

Depth profiles experiments have been performed by Raman spectroscopy on three alkali (Na, Li, K) borosilicate glasses irradiated with 1.8MeV electrons at 1 and 3GGy. These experiments show that molecular oxygen produced under β irradiation is concentrated near the glass surface according to a depth depending on the irradiation dose. Moreover, we observed that the polymerisation increase is the same in the entire volume sample. The average Si–O–Si angle decrease under irradiation is also homogeneous in the whole irradiated glass volume. From all results, we demonstrate that oxygen migrates up to the glass surface during irradiation without strong interaction with the glass network. Migration of oxygen and probably alkalis takes place through percolation channels with a possible departure of oxygen in some cases.