Luminescence enhancement of Ce3+/Tb3+co-doped SiO2thin film on silicon substrate prepared by sol–gel spin coating process

In this work, the luminescence performance of Ce3+ as a sensitizer co-doped with Tb3+ ions in sol–gel silica thin film on silicon substrate has been investigated. Results obtained with x-ray diffraction indicated that SiO2 crystalline was unchanged after 1000°C annealing. In our experiment, although some Ce3+ has been converted to Ce4+ ions during the annealing process, but it has limited impact on increasing trend of emission intensity with the growth of Ce concentration. The luminescence data, including photoluminescence spectra, photoluminescence excitation spectra and fluorescence decay lifetimes indicates that Ce3+ is an efficient sensitizer to feed Tb3+ ions in sol–gel silica film. The calculated energy transfer between Ce3+ and Tb3+ reaches 52.95%. Compared with powder, the film structure provides better tolerance on oxidation and the quench threhold of RE ions is much higher.