Nonradiative Transition Rates Research Articles

Temperature-Induced Luminescence Intensity Fluctuation of Protein-Protected Copper Nanoclusters: Role of Scaffold Conformation vs Nonradiative Transition.

Protein-scaffolded atomically precise metal nanoclusters (NCs) have emerged as a promising class of biofriendly nanoprobes at the forefront of modern research, particularly in the area of sensing. The photoluminescence (PL) intensity of several nanoclusters showed a systematic temperature-dependent fluctuation, but the mechanism remains ambiguous and is poorly understood. We tried to shed some light on this mechanistic aspect by testing a couple of hypotheses: (i) conformational fluctuation of the protein scaffold-mediated PL intensity fluctuation and (ii) PL intensity fluctuation due to the variation in the radiative and nonradiative transition rates. Herein, the PL intensity of the lysozyme-capped copper nanocluster (Lys-Cu NC) showed excellent temperature dependency; upon increasing the temperature, the PL intensity gradually decreased. However, contrasting effects can be seen when the nanocluster is exposed to a chemical denaturant (guanidine hydrochloride (GdnHCl)); the PL intensity increased with the increase in the GdnHCl concentration due to the change in the ionic strength of the medium. This discrepancy clearly suggests that the thermal PL intensity fluctuation cannot be explained by a change in the scaffold conformation. Furthermore, upon closer investigation, we observed a 2-fold increase in the nonradiative decay rate of the Lys-Cu NC at the elevated temperature, which could reasonably explain the decrease in the PL intensity of the nanocluster at the higher temperature. Additionally, from the result, it was evident that the protein scaffold-metal core interaction played a key role here in stabilizing each other; hence, the scaffold structure remained unaffected even in the presence of chemical denaturants.

Thermally Enhanced Phosphorescent Carbon Nanodots for Monitoring Cold-Chain Logistics.

Room-temperature phosphorescent materials, renowned for their long luminescence lifetimes, have garnered significant attention in the field of optical materials. However, the challenges posed by thermally induced quenching have significantly hindered the advancement of luminescence efficiency and stability. In this study, thermally enhanced phosphorescent carbon nanodots (CND) are developed by incorporating them into fiber matrices. Remarkably, the phosphorescence lifetime of the thermally enhanced CND exhibits a twofold enhancement, increasing from 326 to 753ms, while the phosphorescence intensity experienced a tenfold enhancement, increasing from 25 to 245 as the temperature increased to 373K. Rigid fiber matrices can effectively suppress the non-radiative transition rate of triplet excitons, while high temperatures can desorb oxygen adsorbed on the surface of the CND, disrupting the interaction between the CND and oxygen. Consequently, a thermally enhanced phosphorescence is obtained. In addition, benefiting from the thermally enhanced phosphorescence property of CND, a warning indicator with an anti-counterfeiting function for monitoring cold-chain logistics is demonstrated based on CND.

Achieving Nearly 100% Photoluminescence Quantum Efficiency in Organic Radical Emitters by Fine‐Tuning the Effective Donor‐Acceptor Distance

AbstractDonor‐acceptor (D–A•) type luminescent organic radicals have received widespread attention as efficient doublet emitters. However, their generally low photoluminescence quantum efficiency (PLQE) and limited photostability restrict their various applications. Since unraveling the relationship between structure and properties of D–A• type luminescent radicals remains a challenge, here, a series of tri(2,4,6‐trichlorophenyl)methyl (TTM) radical derivatives, which differ by the location of their ring fusion sites and nature of their heteroatoms, is synthesized. The PLQE of isomers varies by ten times as a function of ring fusion sites. In particular, the PLQE of a radical undergoing ring fusion at the carbazole 3,4‐position is as high as 98.0%. Quantum‐chemical calculations show that in the case of overlapping holes and electrons, by increasing the effective distance between the D and A moieties, the radiative transition rates of the radicals increase. Also, decreasing the electronic coupling between the charge‐transfer and local‐excited states and avoiding large geometrical distortions between the ground state (D0)_and the first excited state (D1) can significantly reduce the nonradiative transition rates. This work offers a design strategy to obtain efficient and stable luminescent radicals by modifying the sites of ring fusion, which allows control of the radiative and nonradiative transition rates.

Near infrared emissions from both high efficient quantum cutting (173%) and nearly-pure-color upconversion in NaY(WO4)2:Er3+/Yb3+ with thermal management capability for silicon-based solar cells

Raising photoelectric conversion efficiency and enhancing heat management are two critical concerns for silicon-based solar cells. In this work, efficient Yb3+ infrared emissions from both quantum cutting and upconversion were demonstrated by adjusting Er3+ and Yb3+ concentrations, and thermo-manage-applicable temperature sensing based on the luminescence intensity ratio of two super-low thermal quenching levels was discovered in an Er3+/Yb3+ co-doped tungstate system. The quantum cutting mechanism was clearly decrypted as a two-step energy transfer process from Er3+ to Yb3+. The two-step energy transfer efficiencies, the radiative and nonradiative transition rates of all interested 4 f levels of Er3+ in NaY(WO4)2 were confirmed in the framework of Föster-Dexter theory, Judd-Ofelt theory, and energy gap law, and based on these obtained efficiencies and rates the quantum cutting efficiency was furthermore determined to be as high as 173% in NaY(WO4)2: 5 mol% Er3+/50 mol% Yb3+ sample. Strong and nearly pure infrared upconversion emission of Yb3+ under 1550 nm excitation was achieved in Er3+/Yb3+ co-doped NaY(WO4)2 by adjusting Yb3+ doping concentrations. The Yb3+ induced infrared upconversion emission enhancement was attributed to the efficient energy transfer 4I11/2 (Er3+) + 2F7/2 (Yb3+) → 4I15/2 (Er3+) + 2F5/2 (Yb3+) and large nonradiative relaxation rate of 4I9/2. Analysis on the temperature sensing indicated that the NaY(WO4)2:Er3+/Yb3+ serves well the solar cells as thermos-managing material. Moreover, it was confirmed that the fluorescence thermal quenching of 2H11/2/4S3/2 was caused by the nonradiative relaxation of 4S3/2. All the obtained results suggest that NaY(WO4)2:Er3+/Yb3+ is an excellent material for silicon-based solar cells to improve photoelectric conversion efficiency and thermal management.

Solid-state effect on the luminescence mechanism of thermally activated delayed fluorescence with aggregation induced emission: A theoretical perspective

An investigation of high-performance organic green thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) material, PyB-DPAC, with aggregation-induced luminescence (AIE) characteristics was theoretically conducted by the first principle calculations method in this work. The polarizable continuum mode (PCM) and the combination of quantum mechanics and molecular mechanics (QM/MM) method were employed to consider the liquid-phase and solid-phase environments, respectively. Results show that TADF mechanism of the molecule is mainly due to the occurrence of efficient intersystem crossing (ISC) and reverse intersystem crossing (RISC) processes between S1 and T2, which benefits from the small energy gap, large SOC and the limited changes of molecular geometry structures in solid-phase environment. The increase of radiative transition rate (Kr) and significant decrease of non-radiative transition rate (Knr) is responsible for the AIE property. Our calculations reasonably explained the experimental results and showed that PyB-DPAC is an excellent TADF material with AIE characteristics, this may help to better understand the influence of solid-state effect and the luminescence mechanism of AIE-TADF molecules.

Luminescence properties and Judd-Ofelt analysis of Tb3+ doped Sr2YTaO6 double perovskite phosphors for white LED applications.

A series of Tb3+-doped Sr2YTaO6 double perovskite phosphors (SYT:Tb3+) were synthesized using a conventional solid-state reaction method. A strong green emission was observed in the SYT:Tb3+ phosphors, and the optimal doping concentration of Tb3+ was confirmed to be 5 mol%. The electric dipole-dipole interaction was ascribed to be the main mechanism for the luminescence concentration quenching. Analysis of the concentration-dependent fluorescence decay confirmed that the self-generated quenching model holds for the dynamic process of Tb3+ decays in SYT. Furthermore, the internal quantum efficiencies, non-radiative transition rates, and energy transfer rates of the 5D4 level for the SYT:Tb3+ samples were estimated, respectively. The luminescence thermal stability of the sample was also evaluated based on the Arrhenius model. The chromaticity shift of the SYT:5 mol% Tb3+ phosphor was examined to be 0.013 when the sample temperature was increased from 303 to 483 K, thus indicating excellent chromaticity shifting resistance under high temperature conditions. Moreover, the Judd-Ofelt parameters were calculated from the emission spectra of SYT:Tb3+ to be Ω2 = 0.29 × 10-20, Ω4 = 0.45 × 10-20, and Ω6 = 0.72 × 10-20 cm2, respectively. The fluorescence branching ratios and radiative transition rates for the 5D4 level were calculated based on the obtained Judd-Ofelt parameters. Finally, a white light-emitting diode (LED) prototype was assembled using a 310 nm LED chip combined with a prepared green SYT:Tb3+ phosphor and two other commercial blue and red phosphors. The obtained warm white light exhibits good chromaticity coordinates (0.32, 0.32) and a high color rendering index of 96.1. Based on the above results, it can be known that the prepared SYT:Tb3+ phosphors have a potential application as green emitting phosphors in white LEDs.

Halogen-bonded charge-transfer co-crystal scintillators for high-resolution X-ray imaging.

The development of high-quality organic scintillators encounters challenges primarily associated with the weak X-ray absorption ability resulting from the presence of low atomic number elements. An effective strategy involves the incorporation of halogen-containing molecules into the system through co-crystal engineering. Herein, we synthesized a highly fluorescent dye, 2,5-di(4-pyridyl)thiazolo[5,4-d]thiazole (Py2TTz), with a fluorescence quantum yield of 12.09%. Subsequently, Py2TTz was co-crystallized with 1,4-diiodotetrafluorobenzene (I2F4B) and 1,3,5-trifluoro-2,4,6-triiodobenzene (I3F3B) obtaining Py2TTz-I2F4 and Py2TTz-I3F3. Among them, Py2TTz-I2F4 exhibited exceptional scintillation properties, including an ultrafast decay time (1.426 ns), a significant radiation luminescence intensity (146% higher than Bi3Ge4O12), and a low detection limit (70.49 nGy s-1), equivalent to 1/78th of the detection limit for medical applications (5.5 μGy s-1). This outstanding scintillation performance can be attributed to the formation of halogen-bonding between I2F4B and Py2TTz. Theoretical calculations and single-crystal structures demonstrate the formation of halogen-bond-induced rather than π-π-induced charge-transfer cocrystals, which not only enhances the X-ray absorption ability and material conductivity under X-ray exposure, but also constrains molecular vibration and rotation, and thereby reducing non-radiative transition rate and sharply increasing its fluorescence quantum yields. Based on this, the flexible X-ray film prepared based on Py2TTz-I2F4 achieved an ultrahigh spatial resolution of 26.8 lp per mm, underscoring the superiority of this strategy in developing high-performance organic scintillators.

Hydrogen bond boosts EQEs to 30+% for acridone-carbazole based deep-blue TADF emitters in simple-structure OLEDs

A group of D-A-D type thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) emitters were developed with 10-(pyridin-2-yl)acridin-9(10H)-one as acceptor and substituted carbazoles as donors. The design was focused on incorporating pyridyl to the 10-site nitrogen atom of acridin-9(10H)-one ring, which improved the reverse intersystem crossing rate constant kRISC from 103 s−1 to 105 s−1. More importantly, the linkage of pyridyl uniquely from its 2-position to acridin-9(10H)-one ring induced intramolecular hydrogen bond, which suppressed nonradiative transition rates by three to four orders of magnitude and universally increased the photoluminescence quantum yields from 54 % to nearly 100 %. In combination with the intrinsic high horizontal orientation ratios over 90 % of acridin-9(10H)-one based molecules, such pyridyl decoration boosted the external quantum efficiencies of simple-structure deep blue organic light-emitting diodes to 31–33 % with CIEx of 0.15 and CIEy of 0.09 ∼ 0.12, being double of that for hydrogen-bond-free parent emitter and representing the state-of-the-art efficiencies for the deep blue twisted intramolecular charge transfer type TADF materials with CIEy ≤ 0.10 so far. These TADF emitters are comparable with the prevailing multiresonance blue emitters in terms of distinctive efficiencies, but advantageous in much facile syntheses.

Effect of choosing coordinate systems on computationally predicting nonradiative transition rates of flexible thermally activated delayed fluorescence molecules

AbstractUnderstanding nonradiative transition mechanisms is important in various situations. However, compared with radiative processes where temporal profiles of photon emission can be monitored in a straightforward manner, experimentally accessing the rate information may not be an easy task with nonradiative transitions. Hence, applying theoretical tools toward predicting the rates can be a useful tactic. Such predictions become very useful in designing optoelectronic materials as in the molecules adopted for constructing organic light‐emitting diodes (OLEDs). The correlation function formalism is a method that can fulfill the purpose of designing OLED materials. The formalism requires information regarding the vibrational normal modes of the two electronic states before and after the transition. Because the method is also based on harmonic oscillator approximation, it can actually fail to provide high reliability when there is a large geometric distortion between the initial and the final states. In fact, the harmonic normal mode picture is more prone to lose reliability in the Cartesian coordinates than in the internal ones even at a small distortion, and hence adopting internal coordinates may be more preferable for practical calculations. This is because normal mode mixing becomes less severe when molecular coordinates are described with internal degrees of freedom such as bond stretching, bending, and torsion. In this regard, how much more reliable the nonradiative rate predictions in OLED materials become with the use of internal coordinate system deserves a close inspection. In this account, we review on the derivation of the correlation function formalism and provide how it can be adapted toward the use of the internal coordinates. As a demonstration, we evaluate the intersystem crossing and the internal conversion rates of a series of thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) molecules with both Cartesian and internal coordinate systems. Overall, handling transitions involving substantial structural changes is improved indeed with the internal coordinates. However, limitations are still apparent for the TADF systems with a flexible donor–acceptor type construct especially when the inevitable inter‐domain twisting takes place with the electronic transition. Future prospect for handling the issue is commented as a concluding remark.

A Heavy-atom-free Molecular Motif Based on Centrosymmetric Bird-like Structured Tetraphenylenes with Room-Temperature Phosphorescence (RTP) Afterglow over 8s.

In recent years, pure organic room-temperature phosphorescence (RTP) with highly efficient and long-persistent afterglow has drawn substantial awareness. Commonly, spin-orbit coupling can be improved by introducing heavy atoms into pure-organic molecules. However, this strategy will simultaneously increase the radiative and non-radiative transition rate, further resulting in dramatic decreases in the excited state lifetime and afterglow duration. Here in this work, a highly centrosymmetric bird-like structure tetraphenylene (TeP), and its three symmetrical halogenated derivatives (TeP-F, TeP-Cl and TeP-Br) are synthesized, while their RTP properties and mechanisms are systematically investigated by both theoretical and experimental approaches. As the results, the rigid, highly twisted conformation of TeP restricts the non-radiative processes of RTP and gives rise to the enhancement of electron-exchange, which can contribute to the RTP radiation process. Despite the faint RTP of the bromine and chlorine-substituted ones (TeP-Br, TeP-Cl), the fluoro-substituted TeP-F exhibited a long phosphorescent lifetime of up to 890 ms, corresponding to an extremely long RTP afterglow over 8 s, which could be incorporated into the best series of non-heavy-atom RTP materials reported in previous literature.

A multiscale approach to coupled nuclear and electronic dynamics. II. Exact and approximated evaluation of nonradiative transition rates.

This work follows a companion article, which will be referred to as Paper I [Campeggio et al., J. Chem. Phys. 158, 244104 (2023)] in which a quantum-stochastic Liouville equation for the description of the quantum-classical dynamics of a molecule in a dissipative bath has been formulated in curvilinear internal coordinates. In such an approach, the coordinates of the system are separated into three subsets: the quantum coordinates, the classical relevant nuclear degrees of freedom, and the classical irrelevant (bath) coordinates. The equation has been derived in natural internal coordinates, which are bond lengths, bond angles, and dihedral angles. The resulting equation needs to be parameterized. In particular, one needs to compute the potential energy surfaces, the friction tensor, and the rate constants for the nonradiative jumps among the quantum states. While standard methods exist for the calculation of energy and dissipative properties, an efficient evaluation of the transition rates needs to be developed. In this paper, an approximated treatment is introduced, which leads to a simple explicit formula with a single adjustable parameter. Such an approximated expression is compared with the exact calculation of transition rates obtained via molecular dynamics simulations. To make such a comparison possible, a simple sandbox system has been used, with two quantum states and a single internal coordinate (together with its conjugate momentum). Results show that the adjustable parameter, which is an effective decoherence time, can be parameterized from the effective relaxation times of the autocorrelation functions of the conjugated momenta of the relevant nuclear coordinates.

Thermally Enhanced and Long Lifetime Red TADF Carbon Dots via Multi-Confinement and Phosphorescence Assisted Energy Transfer.

Thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) materials, which can harvest both singlet and triplet excitons for high-efficiency emission, have attracted widespread concern for their enormous applications. Nevertheless, luminescence thermal quenching severely limits the efficiency and operating stability in TADF materials and devices at high temperature. Herein, a surface engineering strategy is adopted to obtain unique carbon dots (CDs)-based thermally enhanced TADF materials with ≈250% enhancement from 273 to 343K via incorporating seed CDs into ionic crystal network. The rigid crystal network can simultaneously boost reverse intersystem crossing process via enhancing spin-orbit coupling between singlet and triplet states and suppressing non-radiative transition rate, contributing to the thermally enhanced TADF character. Benefiting from efficient energy transfer from triplet states of phosphorescence center to singlet states of CDs, TADF emission at ≈600nm in CDs displays a long lifetime up to 109.6ms, outperforming other red organic TADF materials. Thanks to variable decay rates of the delayed emission centers, time and temperature-dependent delayed emission color has been first realized in CDs-based delayed emission materials. The CDs with thermally enhanced and time-/temperature-dependent emission in one material system can offer new opportunities in information protection and processing.

Computational and optoelectronic quantification of semi-conducting, warm ruby red color emanating Eu3+ complexes with hetro-cyclic ligands.

Six Eu3+ complexes were synthesised with β-keto acid as main ligand and secondary ligands through liquid assisted grinding method. These complexes were characterised by various techniques such as spectroscopic technique, XRD, EDAX, SEM analysis, thermal technique, Urbach energy and optical band gap investigation. The luminous photophysical properties were studied by PL spectroscopy in solid as well as solution phase and some theoretical calculation was done to investigate the radiative (Arad) & non-radiative (Anrad) transition rate, quantum efficiency (ɸ), Judd Ofelt parameters for 5D0 → 7F2,4 transitions in both states. Judd Ofelt parameters were also calculated by the JOES software and the outcomes are well harmonised with theoretical values. The complexes have CIE color coordinate value in ruby red region and above 88.65% color purity in both phases, which made them attractive candidates for red light-emitting displays. 5D0 → 7F2 transition was proposed as a laser emission transition owing to their high branching ratio (67.18-74.24%) in solid and (60.09-74.40%) in solution phase. Computational methods were employed to determine the structure and energy of various molecular orbitals. Antimicrobial assay of complexes was also rationalised and found that the complexes are pertinent as good bactericidal and fungicidal agents in pharmaceutical industry.

The location of benzothiazole on the skeleton of rofecoxib defines an AIEgen and its potential application as multifunctional materials

Aggregation-induced emission (AIE) fluorescent molecules with unique photoelectric properties have received extensive attention due to the wide range of applications. In this study, a novel benzothiazole-rofecoxib-based luminogen, o-RBZ, was constructed by integrating the benzothiazole unit into the rofecoxib scaffold. It showed an obvious AIE property, which was investigated and elucidated clearly by systematic experimental and theoretical research. According to single-crystal X-ray and Hirshfeld surface analysis, the highly twisted structure of o-RBZ and restricted-stacking may allow for bright emission in the solid state. Meanwhile, the theoretical calculation revealed that small oscillator strengths (f = 0.06) and a large root mean square deviation (RMSD) were mainly responsible for the large non-radiative transition rate and the suppression of luminous efficacy in DMSO. Furthermore, o-RBZ displayed apparent solvatochromism, mechanochromism, and lipid droplets-specific imaging properties (Pearson's correlative coefficient value of 0.94, low cell cytotoxicity). These findings suggest that AIE-active o-RBZ has the potential to be developed as a multi-functional material for mechanical-force sensors and lipid droplets imaging probes.

Performance enhancement in thermally activated delayed fluorescence emitters by multi-fold layout

A series of thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) materials, namely o-Ac2BBP, o-Px2BBP, D-BP-DMAC and D-BP-PXZ, were designed with double acridine (DMAC) or phenoxazine (PXZ) donors and double carbonyl acceptors. Phenylene and biphenylene were selected as the central bridges for these emitters, and each benzene ring on the central bridge was substituted at ortho-sites. The biphenylene bridge based D-BP-DMAC and D-BP-PXZ show 3D dimensional non-planar conformations and multi-fold layout, which result in multiple intramolecular interactions including C–H⋯O hydrogen bonds and C–H···π interactions and finally strongly stabilized and rigidified the whole molecular structures by locking the molecular geometry. As a result, the nonradiative transition rates (knr) were effectively suppressed by 5 times in comparison with the corresponding phenylene bridged analogues, and the photoluminescence quantum yields were increased to over 95%. The green and yellow OLEDs with D-BP-DMAC and D-BP-PXZ as doped emitters exhibited the maximum external quantum efficiencies (EQE) of 24.3% and 17.3%, which are almost double of the corresponding values (13.1% and 9.3%) of the phenylene bridged analogues o-Ac2BBP and o-Px2BBP. These results indicate that to increase molecular rigidity by multi-fold-layout is an effective design strategy to enhance the performance of TADF materials and OLEDs.

Understanding Yb3+-sensitized photon avalanche in Pr3+ co-doped nanocrystals: modelling and optimization.

Among different upconversion processes where the emitted photon has higher energy than the one absorbed, photon avalanche (PA) is unique, because the luminescence intensity increases by 2-3 orders of magnitude in response to a tiny increase in excitation intensity. Since its discovery in 1979, PA has been observed in bulk materials but until recently, obtaining it at the nanoscale has been a significant challenge. In the present work, the PA phenomenon in β-NaYF4 colloidal nanocrystals co-doped with Pr3+ and Yb3+ ions was successfully observed at 482 nm (3P0 → 3H4) and 607 nm (3P0 → 3H6) under excitation at 852 nm. The impact of Pr3+ ion concentration and pump power dependence on PA behavior was investigated, i.e. PA non-linearity slopes of luminescence intensity curves as a function of pump power density as well as PA thresholds. The highest slopes, namely 8.6 and 9.0, and the smallest thresholds equal to 286 kW cm-2 and 281 kW cm-2, observed for emission bands at 607 nm and 482 nm, respectively, were obtained for NaYF4:0.5%Pr3+,15%Yb3+@NaYF4 colloidal nanocrystals. Besides experimental research, simulations of PA behavior in Pr3+, Yb3+ co-doped materials were performed based on differential rate equations describing the phenomena that contribute to the existence of PA. The influence of different processes leading to PA, e.g. the rates of nonradiative and radiative transitions as well as energy transfers, on PA performance was simulated aiming to understand their roles in this complex sensitized system.

Structure-emission relationship of some coumarin laser dyes and related molecules: Prediction of radiative energy dissipation and the intersystem crossing rate constants.

Dye lasers are commonly used in optical investigation because their solutions in organic solvents deliver tunable, coherent emissions. They exhibit intense fluorescence owing to some specific spectroscopic characteristics. One drawback of the laser dyes is that it shows excessive triplet-state losses (TSLs.) The lack of theoretical predictions of fluorescence rates, intersystem crossing (ISC), and phosphorescence in laser dyes prompted us to report on the predicted rates of radiative and nonradiative transitions of some laser dyes. Structural engineering by some substituents influencing the simulated rates of coumarin laser dye derivatives for an efficient operation was investigated. The NH2 functional group renders the coumarin 120 more fluorescents with reduced TLS than the other investigated materials. Tailoring new efficient laser dyes can be achieved guided by the calculated rates of emission and nonradiative processes.

Optical and computational analysis of red light emitting Eu(III) complexes for applications in luminescent devices

Eight co-ordinated Eu(III) complexes of type [Eu (L3). X] were synthesized for applications in organic light emitting devices. The complexes are reported in solid state, where L is 6-methyl-chromone-3-aldehyde and X represent 2H2O(C1), 1,10-phenanthroline (C2), neocuproine (C3), biquinoline (C4), bathophenanthroline (C5), 5,6-Dimethyl-1,10-phenanthroline (C6). The prepared Eu complexes were characterized by elemental analysis, FT-IR and 13C, 1H NMR, photoluminescence (PL) and thermo-gravimetric analysis/differential thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA/DTA) studies. The photoluminescence emission spectra of solid and solution phase showed five characteristic peaks arising from 5D0→7FJ (J = 0–4) transitions of europium ion obtained at excitation of λex = 370 nm (solid state) and λex = 385 nm (solution). The highest intensity of peak at 615 nm in solid form whereas at 612 nm in solution, indicated strong emission because of 5D0→7F2 transition. This peak is sharp and responsible for superior red color purity. The optical band gap, refractive index and energy transfer mechanism were also obtained for all complexes. Luminescence decay time (τ), radiative and non-radiative transition rate, luminescence efficiency and Judd-Ofelt intensity parameters were analyzed by PL spectroscopy. The CIE color coordinates value and branching ratio values were determined for all synthesized complexes in both solid and solution form. The outcomes revealed that synthesized complexes are magnificent emitters with wide applications in electroluminescent materials, display devices and laser materials.

(Luminescence and Display Materials Division Outstanding Achievement Award) Formulation of Radiative and Nonradiative Transitions of a Polyatomic System within Crude Adiabatic Approximation

The theory of radiative and nonradiative transition rates has been formulated within the framework of crude adiabatic approximation for an optical ion in a solid. The basis set consists of products of electronic wavefunctions at the equilibrium nuclear configuration in the ground electronic state, and the vibronic wavefunction associated with electronic states. The radiative and nonradiative transition rates for relaxation from the excited electronic state to a lower (ground) electronic state are obtained using the Fermi Golden rule and Boltzmann distribution of occupancy of the vibrational states in equilibrium at temperature, , of the excited electronic state. The radiative transition rates are found to be the same as that in the proper adiabatic approximation. The perturbing Hamiltonian that drives the nonradiative transition turns out to be the same as in a typical crystal field Hamiltonian, . Using this Hamiltonian, the nonradiative transition rate has been calculated for a system with a single configuration or normal coordinate, . An auxiliary function, , has been defined to describe the temperature dependence of nonradiative transition rate. At low temperatures, the maximum rate is obtained for where and represent the Huang-Rhys parameter and the energy gap between the two associated electronic states in terms of vibrational energy quantum, respectively. This is in keeping with the classical Arrhenius theory which predicts a peak at when the system relaxes thermally from the excited to the ground electronic state over an energy barrier. The dependence of on for small s-values has been studied to verify the energy gap law observed for multiphonon relaxation between excited states of rare earth ions. For most cases of interest, the temperature dependence of the nonradiative transition rates exhibits a characteristic temperature at which these rates start increasing rapidly with increasing temperature-this is usually observed for most luminescent materials. Other theoretical advantages for using the crude adiabatic theory will be pointed out during the presentation.

(Invited) Temperature Dependence of Nonradiative Transitions of an Excited Optical Ion in Solids Using the Proper Adiabatic Approximation

We have investigated the theory of the temperature dependence of nonradiative transitions of an optical ion in a solid from one electronic state to another using the proper adiabatic theory. The Hamiltonian, based on the nonadiabaticity operator, has been used to calculate the temperature dependence of nonradiative transition rates. The Hamiltonian, Hna , consists of two terms, as shown in Equation 1 below.The first term is usually used to explain nonradiative transitions of an optical ion in solids. We have shown that the first term alone leads to a zero of the transition rates at s = z for low temperature where s represents the Huang-Rhys parameter, and z relates to the energy gap between the excited state and ground state in terms of vibrational quantum of energy, hν. This zero of the transition rate cannot be removed unless the second term is included in the calculation of the transition rates on the basis of the Fermi Golden rule and the Boltzmann distribution of occupation of the vibrational states in thermal equilibrium at temperature, T, in the excited state. Additionally, we define three functions, U1 , U2 , and U3 to describe the thermal dependence of the transition rate, corresponding to the two terms of Hna and a cross term that appears when applying the Fermi Golden rule to calculate the transition rates. A linear combination of these three terms leads to a physically meaningful description of the temperature-dependent, nonradiative transition rate between two electronic states. These functions are used to express the temperature dependence of the quantum efficiency of a phosphor. A comparison of results from simulations and experiments will be presented. Figure 1