Photoluminescence intensity of YxGd1−xVO4:Eu3+ dependence on hydrothermal synthesis time and variable ratio of Y/Gd

It was reported that YxGd1−xVO4:Eu3+ phosphors have been synthesized by a hydrothermal method. Their microstructure and micromorphology have been analyzed by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) and scanning electronic microscope (SEM), which indicates that there exist some cube-like crystals with tetragonal zircon structure, and that the mean particle size is about 180 nm, especially for Y0.2Gd0.8VO4:Eu3+. The optical characteristics of YxGd1−xVO4:Eu3+ present that the phosphor particles show a strong red emission at 617 nm originating from the hypersensitive transition 5D0 → 7F2 of Eu3+ ions, and among x = 0, 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8, 1.0, the luminescence intensity reaches its strongest at x = 0.2. To the best of our knowledge, it was the first time to clarify the correlations between hydrothermal time duration and luminescence properties.