Efficient emission of Silica particles containing Cu or Mn

Abstract

We prepared luminescent silica by sintering porous silica doped with Mn or Cu which works as emission center. By co-dopant Al or Ga to Cu, the blue-green emission was greatly enhanced. In the case of Mn, co-doping of Zn was found to enhance the green emission due to the formation of microcrystalline of Zn2SiO4:Mn in silica. We found that fine control of sintering atmosphere is also a key to achieve a high efficiency. The internal efficiency of these silica was 0.28, 0.58 for Cu-Al doped and Mn-Zn doped silica, respectively.