Materials (Mar 2022)

Wide Concentration Range of Tb<sup>3+</sup> Doping Influence on Scintillation Properties of (Ce, Tb, Gd)<sub>3</sub>Ga<sub>2</sub>Al<sub>3</sub>O<sub>12</sub> Crystals Grown by the Optical Floating Zone Method

  • Tong Wu,
  • Ling Wang,
  • Yun Shi,
  • Xintang Huang,
  • Qian Zhang,
  • Yifei Xiong,
  • Hui Wang,
  • Jinghong Fang,
  • Jinqi Ni,
  • Huan He,
  • Chaoyue Wang,
  • Zhenzhen Zhou,
  • Qian Liu,
  • Qin Li,
  • Jianding Yu,
  • Oleg Shichalin,
  • Evgeniy Papynov

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/ma15062044
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 15, no. 6
p. 2044

Abstract

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To obtain a deeper understand of the energy transfer mechanism between Ce3+ and Tb3+ ions in the aluminum garnet hosts, (Ce, Tb, Gd)3Ga2Al3O12 (GGAG:Ce, Tb) single crystals grown by the optical floating zone (OFZ) method were investigated systematically in a wide range of Tb3+ doping concentration (1–66 at.%). Among those, crystal with 7 at.% Tb reached a single garnet phase while the crystals with other Tb3+ concentrations are mixed phases of garnet and perovskite. Obvious Ce and Ga loss can be observed by an energy dispersive X-ray spectroscope (EDS) technology. The absorption bands belonging to both Ce3+ and Tb3+ ions can be observed in all crystals. Photoluminescence (PL) spectra show the presence of an efficient energy transfer from the Tb3+ to Ce3+ and the gradually quenching effect with increasing of Tb3+ concentration. GGAG: 1% Ce3+, 7% Tb3+ crystal was found to possess the highest PL intensity under excitation of 450 nm. The maximum light yield (LY) reaches 18,941 pho/MeV. The improved luminescent and scintillation characteristics indicate that the cation engineering of Tb3+ can optimize the photoconversion performance of GGAG:Ce.

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