We report on the synthesis, characterization, and physical properties of modified polymeric matrices incorporating silicon atoms in their structure and doped with laser dyes. When the silicon-modified organic matrices incorporated pyrromethene 567 (PM567) and pyrromethene 597 (PM597) dyes as actual solid solutions, highly photostable laser operation with reasonable, nonoptimized efficiencies was obtained under transversal pumping at 532nm. At a pump repetition rate of 10Hz, the intensity of the laser emission remained at the level or above the initial lasing intensity after 100 000 pump pulses in the same position of the sample, corresponding to an estimated accumulated pump energy absorbed by the system of 518 and 1295GJ∕mol for PM567 and PM597, respectively. When the pump repetition rate was increased to 30Hz, the laser emission of dye PM567 decreased steadily and the output energy fell to one-half its initial value after an accumulated pump energy of 989 GJ/mol. Dye PM597 demonstrated a remarkable photostability, and under 30Hz pumping the laser emission from some samples remained stable after 700 000 pump pulses in the same position of the sample, corresponding to an accumulated pump energy of 17300GJ∕mol. Narrow linewidth operation with tuning ranges of up to 31nm was obtained with both pyrromethene dyes when some of the samples were incorporated into a grazing-incidence grating oscillator.

We report on the synthesis, structural characterization, physical properties, and lasing action of two organic dyes, Rhodamine 6G (Rh6G) and Pyrromethene 597 (PM597), incorporated into new hybrid organic-inorganic materials, where the organic component was either poly(2-hydroxyethyl-methacrylate) (PHEMA) or copolymers of HEMA with methyl methacrylate (MMA), and the inorganic counterpart consisted of silica derived from hydrolysis-condensation of methyltriethoxysilane (TRIEOS) in weight proportion of up to 30%. Lasing efficiencies of up 23% and high photostabilities, with no sign of degradation in the initial laser output after 100 000 pump pulses at 10 Hz, were demonstrated when pumping the samples transversely at 534 nm with 5.5 mJ/pulse. A direct relationship could be established between the structure of the hybrid materials, analyzed by solid-state NMR, and their laser behavior. An inorganic network dominated by di-/tri- substituted silicates in a proportion approximately 35:65, corresponding to samples of HEMA with 15 and 20 wt % proportion of TRIEOS, optimizes the lasing photostability. The thermal properties of these materials, together with the high homogeneity revealed by atomic force microscopy (AFM) images, even in compounds with high silica content, indicate their microstructure to be a continuous phase, corresponding to the polymer matrix, which "traps" the silica components at molecular level via covalent bonding, with few or no silica islands.

Modified polymeric matrices incorporating silicon atoms in their structure and doped with lasing dyes have been synthesized and demonstrated to render improved laser performance. When transversely pumped at 532nm, highly stable laser operation with reasonable, not-optimized efficiencies was obtained. Materials were prepared where dyes pyrromethene 567 and pyrromethene 597 emitted laser radiation with no sign of degradation in the laser output, albeit with some oscillations, after 100 000pump pulses in the same position of the sample at 10Hz repetition rate.

The design and synthesis of new fluorinated polymers opens new challenges for the science of materials and enhances novel properties, economic processes, and innovative applications, especially in optoelectronic and biophotonic fields. The development of efficient, highly stable and inexpensive hosts for laser dyes promises to fill the gap between non-user-friendly liquid dye lasers and expensive inorganic solid-state lasers.