Orange color emitting Sm3+ ions doped borosilicate glasses for optoelectronic device applications

Abstract

An intense orange color emitting Sm3+ activated Li2O–PbO–ZnO–Al2O3–B2O3–SiO2 (LPZABS) glasses were propitiously fabricated by using sudden quenching method to study the luminescent potentiality using spectroscopic techniques such as XRD, FT-IR, optical absorption, photoluminescence (PL) and PL decay. XRD and FT-IR reveals the glassy nature and various functional groups present in LPZABS host glass respectively. Judd-Ofelt parameters derived from absorption spectra are used to estimate various radiative parameters for the excited states of Sm3+ ions in LPZABS glasses. Under 400 nm excitation, the luminescence spectra in the as prepared glasses exhibit three emission bands that corresponds to 4G5/2 → 6H5/2 (562 nm), 4G5/2 → 6H7/2 (598 nm) and 4G5/2 → 6H9/2 (645 nm) transitions of Sm3+ ions. Among these three, 4G5/2 → 6H9/2 transition observed in orange region (598 nm) is relatively more intense and prominent. The PL decay curves recorded for 4G5/2 fluorescent level reveal exponential behavior and single exponential fitting is applied to evaluate the experimental lifetimes (τexp). The τexp values are found to be decreasing with Sm3+ ion content due to cross-relaxation energy transfer process. The results reveal that the as prepared glasses can be effectively used in fabricating intense visible orange color emitting optoelectronic devices.