Cerium-doped orthophosphate scintillators

Book · Sat Dec 31 04:00:00 EST 1994

OSTI ID:79852

Wojtowicz, A J; Wisniewski, D ^[1]; Lempicki, A ^[1]; Boatner, L A ^[2]

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1. Boston Univ., MA (United States). Chemistry Dept.
2. Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (United States). Solid State Division

Cerium-doped lutetium orthophosphate (LuPO{sub 4}:Ce) is one of the most promising new scintillator materials. In this paper the authors report on the effects of total or partial replacement of Lu by Yb. When not doped with Ce, crystals of Yb{sub x}Lu{sub 1{minus}x}PO{sub 4} scintillate rather poorly, the emission being due to the Yb charge transfer transition. Activation with Ce reduces the light output from Yb even further, while correspondingly the addition of Yb to LuPO{sub 4}:Ce also degrades that material`s scintillation performance. The authors suggest that the nonradiative decay of the (Yb{sup 2+}-Ce{sup 4+}) charge transfer state is responsible for the mutual quenching of these ions. The differences in performance of LuPO{sub 4}:Yb and LuPO{sub 4}:Ce indicate that energy transfer mechanisms ordinarily associated with materials containing molecular anionic groups may not be quite sufficient to explain the results. Suggestions are presented that under {gamma}-excitation the lattice-to-ion energy transfer in orthophosphates is accomplished by sequential capture of charge carriers rather than the more conventional mechanism of exciton hopping between molecular groups.

• DOE Contract Number: FG02-90ER61033; AC05-84OR21400
• OSTI ID: 79852
• Report Number(s): CONF-940411--; ISBN 1-55899-248-0
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
44 INSTRUMENTATION
INCLUDING NUCLEAR AND PARTICLE DETECTORS
DOPED MATERIALS
ELECTRONIC STRUCTURE
EXPERIMENTAL DATA
INORGANIC PHOSPHORS
LUTETIUM PHOSPHATES
METALLURGICAL EFFECTS
PERFORMANCE
SCINTILLATIONS
SOLID SCINTILLATION DETECTORS
YTTERBIUM
YTTERBIUM PHOSPHATES