Synthesis of rare earth and transition metal ions doped nanoparticles structural morphological and luminescence studies

Abstract

Nanomaterials or nanostructured materials are the materials with structural features in between those of atoms/ molecules and bulk materials, with at least one dimension in the range of 1 to 100 nm (1 nm =10-9 m). The exponential growth of nanomaterials stems from their unique physical and chemical properties and functionalities that often differ significantly from the corresponding bulk counterparts. It has been realized over the last two decades that the size and shape of materials play a major role in deciding their properties. Many of the unique properties of nanomaterials are extremely promising for emerging technological applications, including nanoelectronics, nanophotonics, biomedicine, information storage, communication, energy conversion, catalysis, environmental protection, and space exploration. One of the most fascinating and useful aspects of nanomaterials is their optical properties, including linear and non-linear absorption, photoluminescence, electroluminescence, and light scattering. The optical or luminescence properties of the nanomaterials can arise either due to their inherent property or due to doping of luminescent species like lanthanide ions. newline