Elaboration and luminescence of cerium-doped lutetium silicate glass-ceramics via in-situ growth from containerless processed lutetium silicate glass

Amorphous cerium-doped lutetium silicate scintillator was fabricated through aerodynamic levitation method. The lutetium silicate glass scintillator transformed into glass-ceramics after annealing at 950 °C in air. The crystalline phase of the glass-ceramics was composed with lutetium oxyorthosilicate (Lu2SiO5:Ce, LSO:Ce) and lutetium pyrosilicate (Lu2Si2O7:Ce, LPS:Ce). The crystalline parts of the glass-ceramics, i.e., the micro-sized polycrystalline LPS/LSO particles, consist of nano-sized LPS and LSO grains. The in-line transmittance of the LPS/LSO:Ce glass and glass-ceramics are 86% at 600 nm. The luminescence characteristics of the highly transparent LPS/LSO:Ce glass and glass-ceramics were investigated through Photoluminescence (PL), Photoluminescence Excitation (PLE) and Cathodoluminescence (CL). It suggests that combination of containerless processing and in-situ growth of lutetium silicate from glass matrix is a promising route to fabricate highly transparent lutetium silicate scintillators.