TY - JOUR A1 - Ritter, B. A1 - Haida, P. A1 - Fink, F. A1 - Krahl, T. A1 - Gawlitza, Kornelia A1 - Rurack, Knut A1 - Scholz, G. A1 - Kemnitz, E. T1 - Novel and easy access to highly luminescent Eu and Tb doped ultra-small CaF2, SrF2 and BaF2 nanoparticles – structure and luminescence T2 - Dalton Transactions N2 - A universal fast and easy access at room temperature to transparent sols of nanoscopic Eu3+ and Tb3+ doped CaF2, SrF2 and BaF2 particles via the fluorolytic sol–gel synthesis route is presented. Monodisperse quasi-spherical nanoparticles with sizes of 3–20 nm are obtained with up to 40% rare earth doping showing red or green luminescence. In the beginning luminescence quenching effects are only observed for the highest content, which demonstrates the unique and outstanding properties of these materials. From CaF2:Eu10 via SrF2:Eu10 to BaF2:Eu10 a steady increase of the luminescence intensity and lifetime occurs by a factor of ≈2; the photoluminescence quantum yield increases by 29 to 35% due to the lower phonon energy of the matrix. The fast formation process of the particles within fractions of seconds is clearly visualized by exploiting appropriate luminescence processes during the synthesis. Multiply doped particles are also available by this method. Fine tuning of the luminescence properties is achieved by variation of the Ca-to-Sr ratio. Co-doping with Ce3+ and Tb3+ results in a huge increase (>50 times) of the green luminescence intensity due to energy transfer Ce3+ → Tb3+. In this case, the luminescence intensity is higher for CaF2 than for SrF2, due to a lower spatial distance of the rare earth ions. PB - Royal Society of Chemistry KW - Luminescence materials KW - Alkaline earth metal fluorides KW - Fluorolytic sol–gel synthesis PY - 2017 UR - https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-bam/frontdoor/index/index/docId/39286 AN - OPUS4-39286 VL - 46 IS - 9 SP - 2925 EP - 2936 AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany