Highly Efficient Broadband Near-Infrared Luminescence with Zero-Thermal-Quenching in Garnet Y3In2Ga3O12:Cr3+ Phosphors

Broadband near-infrared (NIR) light source based on phosphor-converted light-emitting-diode (pc-LED) is crucial for applications in medical diagnosis, food quality analysis, and night vision fields, motivating the development of highly efficient and thermal robust NIR phosphor materials. Herein, a novel Cr3+-doped garnet phosphor Y3In2Ga3O12:Cr3+ emerges from a fundamental study of the Ln3In2Ga3O12 (Ln = La, Gd, Y, and Lu) family. Upon 450 nm excitation, this material presents a broadband NIR emission covering 650–1100 nm with a peak located at 760 nm and a full width at half maximum of 125 nm. This material also possesses an ultrahigh internal quantum efficiency (IQE = 91.6%) and absorption efficiency (AE = 46.6%), resulting in an external quantum efficiency as high as 42.7%. Moreover, the emission intensity of this material at 150 °C maintains 100% of the initial intensity, showing a rare zero-thermal-quenching property. Fabricating an NIR pc-LED device by using this material, an excellent NIR output power of 68.4 mW with a photoelectric efficiency of 15.9% under 150 mA driving current can be obtained, which exhibits much better performance than the devices fabricated by using some reported efficient NIR materials. Therefore, this work not only provides an ultraefficient and thermally robust broadband NIR material for spectroscopy application but also contributes to the foundation of design rules of NIR materials with high performance.