Development of nanophosphors - A review

Nanophosphors have been extensively investigated during the last decade due to their application potential for various high-performance displays and devices. These act as a strategic component in almost all displays. Synthesis of nanophosphors can be accomplished in two ways namely, chemical and physical methods. Under chemical methods, different routes such as colloidal, capping, cluster formation, sol-gel, electrochemical, etc., are being followed. Physical methods widely used are molecular beam epitaxy, ionised cluster beam, liquid metal ion source, consolidation, sputtering and gas aggregation of monomers. Chemical precipitation in presence of capping agents, reaction in microemulsions, sol-gel reaction and autocombustion are commonly used techniques for synthesis of nanophosphors. However, the particle size has to be restricted to 3-5 nm to get the real advantage of quantum confinement. In other words, the particle size must be less than twice of Bohr radii of exciton as quantum confinement regime is limited to that size. A brief review of different synthesis techniques employed all over the world for the development of industrially important nanophosphors and extent of particle size reduction achieved is discussed. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.