Scintillation properties of Ce-doped Yb3Al5O12 single crystals

Abstract

Yb3Al5O12 (YbAG) single crystals were prepared by the Floating Zone (FZ) method with and without doping with different concentrations of Ce, and then we evaluated their basic scintillation properties. All the samples showed scintillation with emission peaks in the range from 300 nm to 600 nm. The origin of this emission peak was attributed to the charge transfer luminescence of Yb3+. In addition, the Ce-doped samples showed three strong emission bands, in which the emission origin is also predominantly due to the charge transfer emission but the spectrum was deformed due to a self-absorption by the 4f-5d transitions of Ce3+. Scintillation decay profiles of all the samples were approximated by a sum of two exponential decay functions, and the obtained decay times were 1 and 9–10 ns. Among the present samples, the 0.5% Ce-doped sample showed the lowest scintillation afterglow level. All the samples demonstrated a full energy peak in the pulse height spectrum measured under 241Am 5.5 MeV α-ray irradiation. Among the present samples, the undoped sample showed the highest light yield with a value of 20 ph/5.5 MeV-α.