抄録
Sol-gel process is advantageous in coloring a glass with organic dye, since it does not require temperatures higher than 100°C. However, coloring a glass by organic dye requires a dyeing solvent when the dye is not directly soluble in glass matrix. We showed that the dyeing solvent forms microdroplets in glass matrix to accommodate the organic dye for vivid coloring when sol-gel derived silica glass is successfully colored with organic dye. The size of the microdroplets is determined by the volatility of solvent during the drying process of silica glass, i. e., smaller volatility of solvent leads to larger microdroplets. Optical transparency of the dyed glass is retained when the final size of the microdroplets is much smaller than 1μm with a use of relatively large volatility of the dyeing solvent.
