THERMALLY-INDUCED OPTICAL-PHASE CONJUGATION IN SOLUTIONS OF C-60 IN AVARIETY OF ORGANIC-SOLVENTS

The phase-conjugate properties of solutions of buckminsterfullerene C- 60 in a number of organic solvents have been investigated in the nanos econd time domain. Thermal grating established theory is shown to expl ain satisfactorily the experimental results, and evidence was found of the propagation in a nonlinear medium of acoustic waves generated by a nonuniform heating process, suggesting that a thermal mechanism is r esponsible for the long-lived component of the nonlinearity. Order of magnitude estimations of the thermally induced third-order susceptibil ity were obtained, and a correlation between effective thermalization yield and solvents' polarizability parameter (n(2) - 1)/(2n(2) + 1) wa s found.