Structural and optical characteristics of pure and 5%RE (Tb, Y and Eu) doped ZnO

Abstract

In the present work, RE doped ZnO nano-powder has been successfully prepared by solid-state reaction. The products were obtained by doping commercial ZnO with 5% of three different rare earth elements; Europium Eu, Terbium Tb and Yttrium Y. The investigation results showed that the prepared materials exhibit predominant hexagonal wurtzite structure and have grain size between 20–65 nm. The band gap of the doped samples decreased from 3.212 to 3.137 eV; whereas, the optical absorption increased from 35% to 70%. The photoluminescence investigation showed that ZnO samples exhibit violet, blue and green emission that red shifts upon increasing structural distortion. Overall, the findings demonstrated the possibility of controlling ZnO visible light emission and control it to emit at a desired region that is beneficial for light emitting diodes and screen displays.