Fabrication of Enhanced Red Emitting Nd3+ free 808 Nm Responsive Self-Sensitized Upconverting Nanocrystal

Abstract

Photonic upconversion materials convert low-energy photons into high-energy photons. The success of these UC materials in their respective fields of application like biomedicines, solar cells, photocatalysis etc., is critically dependent on the intensities of the corresponding upconversion luminescence (UCL), considerable research has been devoted to generate brighter UC materials with a purpose to understand the fundamental basis or mechanism of the enhanced UCL intensity The most widely accepted crystal engineering technique to enhance the intensity of upconversion(UC) materials is doping of the non-lanthanide ions. Since. The conventional upconversion process is generally based on sensitizer (Yb3+) – activator (Er3+,Tm3+,Ho3+) doped system. However, exceptional UC luminescence can also be presented by systems doped with one type of Ln3+ ions, which are characterized by self-sensitization properties, for instance, Er3+ ions which produces a red emitting upconverting material. The objective of current research of our group focusses on how the red upconversion luminescence can be further enhanced by mediating the upconversion dynamics through crystal engineering technique or through addition of shell layer which effectively perturb the local symmetry around the lanthanide ion and minimize the quenching effect respectively and the behavior of lattice strain in these types of doped selfsensitized upconverting materials using Williamson-Hall plot which yet has not been explored. Also, synchrotron radiations have been utilized to understand the structural insights of the material by utilizing the techniques like Pair Distribution Function (PDF) analysis to get a better understanding of the structure at the local level.