The Energy Transfer and Thermal Stability of a Blue‐Green Color Tunable K2CaP2O7:Ce3+,Tb3+ Phosphor

Abstract

Novel blue‐green emitting Ce3+‐ and Tb3+‐activated K2CaP2O7 (KCPO) luminescent materials were synthesized via a solid‐state reaction method. X‐ray diffraction, luminescence spectroscopy, decay time, and fluorescent thermal stability tests have been used to characterize the prepared samples. The KCPO:Ce3+,Tb3+ luminescence spectra show broad band of Ce3+ ions and characteristic line of Tb3+ ion transition (5D4–7F5). The color variation in the light emitting from blue to green under UV excitation can be obtained by tailoring the Tb3+ content in KCPO:Ce3+. Besides, Ce3+ ions obviously intensify Tb3+ ion emission through an effective energy transfer process, which was confirmed from decay curves. The energy transfer efficiency was determined to be 82.51%. A resonant type mechanism via the dipole–quadrupole interaction can be proposed for energy transfer. As a whole, the KCPO:Ce3+,Tb3+ phosphor exhibits excellent performance in the range from 77 to 673 K, indicating the phosphors are highly potential candidates for solid‐state lighting.