Monodisperse spherical mesoporous Eu-doped TiO2 phosphor particles and the luminescence properties

Monodisperse spherical and mesoporous Eu-doped TiO2 phosphor particles were prepared by nonionic surfactant-assisted soft-chemistry method. It is shown that the phosphor particles possess submicron diameter of about 250 nm and narrow size distribution. Under ultraviolet irradiation the particles show characteristic luminescence corresponding to D-5(0)-F-7(j) of Eu3+. Especially, the calcined particles consisted of mesopores and semicrystalline framework shows the strongest photoluminescence compared to the amorphous particles without annealing and the completely crystalline particles annealed at higher temperature. This is attributed to the energy transfer from titania nanocrystallite to Eu3+ ions dispersed in glassy amorphous titania region. (c) 2007 American Institute of Physics.