Effects of Undercoats and Overcoats on Damage Thresholds of 248 nm Coatings

摘要

Previous experiments have demonstrated that 1064 nm high reflectors benefit from the addition of halfwave silica overcoats, and that 1064 nm antireflection coatings can be improved by adding halfwave silica undercoats or barrier layers. In each case, a statistical improvement of about 50% has been observed. This paper reports similar results for coatings designed for 248 nm. The high reflectors were scandia/magnesium fluoride quaterwave stacks. Three design variations were tested: with no overcoat, with a halfwave silica overcoat, and with a halfwave magnesium fluoride overcoat. The presence of the overcoat more than doubled the threshold of the reflectors. The highest threshold, 8.5 joules/sq. cm, was measured on a reflector with a magnesium fluoride overcoat. Two material combinations were used for the four-layer antireflection coatings: scandia/silica and scandia/magnesium fluoride. Each of these combinations was coated without a barrier layer, with a silica barrier layer, and with a magnesium fluoride barrier layer. The barrier layer was an undercoat with a halfwave optical thickness. Varying degrees of improvement in thresholds, ranging up to 50%, were found in all cases with barrier layers. The highest thresholds exceeded 6 joules/sq. cm for scandia/silica coatings with silica barrier layers. (ERA citation 07:047435)