Synthesis and luminescence properties of Ca5(PO4)3Cl:Eu2+ phosphor for solid state lighting

A novel method to prepare Eu2+ doped chlorapatite phosphor Ca5(PO4)3Cl useful for solid state lighting has been given in this paper. The phosphor was synthesized by the Pechini (citrate gel) method which turned out to be more efficient than the conventional high temperature solid state reaction. The results of the photoluminescence (PL) investigation revealed that it was possible to efficiently excite the phosphor by a UV–visible light from 220 to 430 nm; the phosphor exhibited a bright blue emission at the wavelength λem = 456 nm for the excitation wavelength λex = 350 nm of near-ultraviolet light. The developed phosphor emits in blue and, hence, could provide one of the three (RGB) primary color components in a phosphor-converted LED-producing white light.