Synthesis and luminescent properties of SrZnO2:Eu3+,M+ (M = Li, Na, K) phosphor

In this paper, a series of novel luminescent materials, SrZnO2:Eu3+,M+ (M = Li, Na, K) have been synthesized by conventional solid-state reaction. X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns and photoluminescence (PL) spectra were carried out to characterize their structural and luminescent properties. It was found that under ultraviolet excitation with a wavelength of 301 nm, SrZnO2:Eu3+ gives a red luminescence that was attributed to the transitions from 5D0 excited states to 7FJ (J = 0–4) ground states of Eu3+ ions. The feature and the high intensity of hypersensitive transition 5D0 → 7F2 indicate that Eu3+ prefers to occupy a low symmetry site. The incorporation of alkali metal ions greatly enhanced the luminescence intensity and slightly changed the excitation and emission peak position, probably due to the influence of the coordination conditions for Eu3+ ions.