Arsenic chalcogenides: from painting in ancient Egypt to all-optical chalcogenide glass chip

Abstract

Generally, arsenic can be found in more than 320 minerals, including orpiment (As2S3) and realgar (r-As4S4), which were used as paint pigments formerly. Nowadays there is an issue connected with difficulties in finding the best illumination method for artworks belonging to the cultural heritage. In nature, the arsenic bearing sulfides are oxidized and the increasing concentration of the dissolved arsenic can produce serious environmental problems.It was found that general dissolution behavior and products for amorphous As2S3 and orpiment are comparable and differ only in terms of pH-dependency, reaction kinetics, and efficacy with generally lower activation.