Excellent Color Purity and Luminescence Thermometry Performance in Germanate Tellurite Glass Doped with Eu3+ and Tb3+

Abstract

Germanate tellurite glasses doped with Eu3+ and Tb3+ were synthesized by the conventional melt-quenching method. There is no indication of the energy transfer between dopant ions in this host, but the co-dopants exhibit excellent color purity of 100% for Eu3+ and 80% for Tb3+. The co-doped glass exhibits yellow luminescence. The quantum yield of the Eu3+ emission is equal to 23% under 395 nm excitation. The thermal quenching of Eu3+ and Tb3+ luminescence occurs at different temperature ranges, which enables the thermal sensing properties of the material. The relative fluorescence intensity ratio (FIR) sensitivity of 0.16% K−1 was recorded in the wide range of temperatures spanning from −193 °C up to 0 °C. The temperature dependence of the decay times was also studied. The lifetime-based temperature sensitivity was determined to be 0.95% K−1 at 250 °C for Tb3+5D3 level emission and 0.3% K−1 at 225 °C for Eu3+5D1 level emission.