Effects of Ce3+ doping concentrations on microstructure and luminescent properties of Ce3+:Lu3Al5O12 (Ce:LuAG) transparent ceramics

Ce3+ doping behaviour in range from 1.0 to 10.0 mol% on Ce:LuAG polycrystalline powders and ceramics was investigated in this paper. It was found that CeO2 would segregate as secondary phase from Ce:LuAG powders when the Ce3+ doping concentration reached to 5.0 mol% under the calcination of 1100 degrees C for 10 h in air. However, this over-doped phenomenon disappeared after the powders being densified into transparent ceramics by vacuum sintering. When the Ce3+ doping concentration was further increased into 10.0 mol%, the CeO2 segregation regions were observed in the corresponding Ce:LuAG ceramic with an elongated rod morphology. The drastic dropping of in-line optical transmittance of the 10.0 mol% Ce:LuAG ceramic demonstrated that the CeO2 secondary phase would form defects and/or electron traps at grain boundaries which embarrassed the energy transfer from host lattice to Ce3+ luminescent centers leading to its poor scintillation property. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.