Study on Upconversion and Thermal Properties of Tm3+/Yb3+ Co-Doped La₂O₃-Nb₂O₅-Ta₂O₅ Glasses

Minghui Zhang; Haiqin Wen; Xiuhong Pan; Jianding Yu; Hui Shao; Fei Ai; Huimei Yu; Meibo Tang; Lijun Gai

doi:10.3390/ma11081352

Study on Upconversion and Thermal Properties of Tm³⁺/Yb³⁺ Co-Doped La₂O₃-Nb₂O₅-Ta₂O₅ Glasses

Materials (Basel). 2018 Aug 3;11(8):1352. doi: 10.3390/ma11081352.

Authors

Minghui Zhang^{1

2}, Haiqin Wen³, Xiuhong Pan⁴, Jianding Yu⁵, Hui Shao⁶, Fei Ai⁷, Huimei Yu⁸, Meibo Tang⁹, Lijun Gai¹⁰

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200050, China. zhangminghui@mail.sic.ac.cn.
² Laboratory for Materials and Structures, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Midori-ku, Yokohama 226-8503, Japan. zhangminghui@mail.sic.ac.cn.
³ State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200050, China. hqwen@mail.sic.ac.cn.
⁴ State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200050, China. xhpan@mail.sic.ac.cn.
⁵ State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200050, China. yujianding@mail.sic.ac.cn.
⁶ School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang 212003, China. saihuiwork@163.com.
⁷ State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200050, China. aifei@mail.sic.ac.cn.
⁸ School of Materials Science and Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai 200237, China. huimeiyu@ecust.edu.cn.
⁹ State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200050, China. mbtang@mail.sic.ac.cn.
¹⁰ State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200050, China. gailijun@mail.sic.ac.cn.

Abstract

The effect of Yb³⁺ ions on upconversion luminescence and thermal properties of Tm³⁺/Yb³⁺ co-doped La₂O₃-Nb₂O₅-Ta₂O₅ glasses has been studied. Glass transition temperature is around 740 °C, indicating high thermal stability. The effect of Yb³⁺ ions on the thermal stability is not obvious. Both the glass forming ability and the upconversion luminescence first increase and then decrease with the increase of Yb³⁺ ions. The glasses perform low glass forming ability with ΔT around 55 °C. Blue and red emissions centered around 477, 651, and 706 nm are obtained at the excitation of 976 nm laser. The upconversion luminescence mechanism is energy transfer from Yb³⁺ to Tm³⁺ mixed with two- and three- photon processes. The thermal kinetic Differential Thermal Analysis (DTA)-analysis indicates that the average activation energy first increases and then decreases with the increase of Yb³⁺ ions. This result can be introduced in order to improve upconversion luminescence of glasses by crystallization in the future. Tm³⁺/Yb³⁺ co-doped La₂O₃-Nb₂O₅-Ta₂O₅ glasses with good upconversion and thermal properties show promising applications in solid-state laser, optical temperature sensing.

Keywords: containerless processing; oxide glasses; thermal properties; upconversion luminescence.