Premium
Relation of Crystallinity and Fluorescent Properties of LaF 3 :Nd 3+ Nanoparticles Synthesized with Different Water‐Based Techniques
Author(s) -
Vanetsev Alexander,
Kaldvee Karel,
Puust Laurits,
Keevend Kerda,
Nefedova Alexandra,
Fedorenko Stanislav,
Baranchikov Alexander,
Sildos Ilmo,
Rähn Mihkel,
Sammelselg Väino,
Orlovskii Yurii
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
chemistryselect
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.437
H-Index - 34
ISSN - 2365-6549
DOI - 10.1002/slct.201701075
Subject(s) - crystallinity , fluorescence , materials science , nanoparticle , dopant , crystal (programming language) , crystal structure , chemical engineering , analytical chemistry (journal) , doping , nanotechnology , chemistry , crystallography , organic chemistry , composite material , physics , computer science , optoelectronics , quantum mechanics , engineering , programming language
We use two water based synthetic approaches to LaF 3 :Nd 3+ nanoparticles (NPs), hydrothermal microwave treatment (HTMW) and co‐precipitation (CO) technique, with different temperature of the reaction mixture to study the correlation between the degree of crystallinity of LaF 3 :Nd 3+ NPs and their fluorescence properties. We showed that the fluorescence spectra and quenching kinetics can be a powerful tool to reveal the crystal lattice defects, namely agglomerations of the dopant ions (Nd 3+ ) and the OH − positioned in the volume of the doped NPs. We found that reduced number of such crystal lattice defects as Nd 3+ pairs and clusters and the OH groups in the volume of the HTMW NPs leads to much higher fluorescence brightness than for CO NPs. The higher temperature of reaction mixture during HTMW synthesis results in better crystallinity and much higher fluorescence brightness of the produced NPs. But we believe that these results could be applied more generally to the development of synthetic strategies for bright fluorescent NPs. In sum, it's not the condition of NPs surface, but the degree of their crystallinity should be a major concern while choosing the synthetic path, as it generally predetermines their fluorescent properties.