Structural relaxation of Sb2Se98 chalcogenide glass and its effect on following crystallization

This work focuses on a comprehensive study of the structural relaxation of chalcogenide glass and the possible influence of relaxation on subsequent crystallization. Chalcogenide glass of composition Sb2Se98 was studied using differential scanning calorimetry. Non-isothermal cyclic experiments were performed, as well as isothermal annealing at temperatures in the range of 25–35 °C. The Tool-Narayanaswamy-Moynihan model was used to describe the relaxation data, and all methods of estimating some of its parameters were applied. Finally, the parameters were refined by numerical fitting and their values for individual types of experiments are discussed. The reproducibility of individual relaxation datasets is also described in detail. Attention is also paid to subsequent crystallization after the relaxation experiments.