Radiative properties of α-ZnAl2S4:V spinel type single crystals

The absorption and luminescent properties of α-ZnAI2S4:V spinel type crystals in the temperature range 10-300 K are investigated. The spectra are assigned to the electronic transitions of trivalent vanadium ions located in octahedral sites. It is shown that at low temperatures the three main components of the revealed IR luminescence spectra are caused by the 1A1g(1G)→1Eg(1D), 1T2g(1D), 3T2g(3F)→3T1g(3F), and 1Eg(1D)→3T1g(3F) transitions. The observed dependencies of the emission components intensities on temperature are explained assuming that there is a phonon assisted tunnelling between 3T2g(3F) and 1Eg(1D) states. On temperature rise, the 3T2g(3F)→3T1g(3F) vibronic transitions suppress other emission channels, which leads to the enhancement of the integral luminescence intensity and to the broadening of the spectrum centred at λ=1.4 μm.