Photoelectrocatalytic activity of immobilized Yb doped WO3 photocatalyst for degradation of methyl orange dye

Pure WOand Yb:WOthin films have been synthesized by spray pyrolysis technique. Effect of Yb doping concentration on photoelectrochemical, structural, morphological and optical properties of thin films are studied. X-ray diffraction analysis shows that all thin films are polycrystalline nature and exhibit monoclinic crystal structure. The 3 at% Yb:WOfilm shows superior photoelectrochemical（PEC） performance than that of pure WOfilm and it shows maximum photocurrent density（Iph= 1090 μA/cm） having onset potentials around +0.3 V/SCE in 0.01 M HClO. The photoelectrocatalytic process is more effective than that of the photocatalytic process for degradation of methyl orange（MO） dye. Yb doping in WOphotocatalyst is greatly effective to degrade MO dye. The enhancement in photoelectrocatalytic activity is mainly due to the suppressing the recombination rate of photogenerated electron-hole pairs. The mineralization of MO dye in aqueous solution is studied by measuring chemical oxygen demand（COD） values.

Frequency Up-conversion Luminescence Properties and Mechanism of Tm^(3+) /Er^(3+)/Yb^(3+) Co-doped Oxyfluorogermanate Glasses

Oxyfluoride glasses were developed with composition 60GeO 2 ·10AlF 3 ·25BaF 2 ·（1.95-x）GdF 3 · 3YbF 3 ·0.05TmF 3 ·xErF 3 （x=0.02,0.05,0.08,0.11,0.14,0.17）in mole percent.Intense blue（476 nm）,green（524 and 546 nm）and red（658 nm）emissions which identified from the 1G 4 →3H 6 transition of Tm3＋and the（2H 11/2 ,4S 3/2 ）→4I 15/2 ,4F 9/2 →4I 15/2 transitions of Er3＋,respectively,were simultaneously observed under 980 nm excitation at room temperature.The results show that multicolor luminescence including white light can be adjustably tuned by changing doping concentrations of Er3＋ion or the excitation power.In addition,the energy transfer processes among Tm3＋,Er3＋and Yb3＋ions,and up-conversion mechanisms are discussed.

Emission Properties of Yb^(3+)/Er^(3+) Doped TeO_2-WO_3-ZnO Glasses for Broadband Optical Amplifiers

The Yb3+/Er3+ doped TeO2-WO3-ZnO glasses were prepared. The absorption spectra, emission spectra and fluorescence lifetime of Er3+ at 1.5 um, excited by 970 nm were measured. The influence of Er2O3, Yb2O3 and OH-contents on emission properties of Er3+ at 1.5μm was investigated. The optimum doping concentrations for Er3+ and Yb3+ is around 3.34×1020 ions/cm3 and 6.63×1020 ions/cm3, respectively. The peak emission cross section is 0.83~0.87 pm2. With the increasing concentration of Yb3+, the FWHM of Er3+ emission at 1.5μm in the glass increases from 77 nm to 83 nm. The results show that Yb3+/Er3+ doped TeO2-WO3-ZnO glasses are promising candidate for Er3+-doped broadband optical amplifier.

Fabrication and thermoelectric properties of Yb-doped ZrNiSn half-Heusler alloys

Half-Heusler(HH)alloys constitute an important class of materials that exhibit promising potential in high-temperature thermoelectric(TE)power generation.In this work,we synthesized Zr_(1−x)Yb_(x)NiSn(x=0,0.01,0.02,0.04,0.06 and 0.10)HH alloys using a time-efficient levitation melting and spark plasma sintering procedure.X-ray diffraction showed that the samples were predominantly single phased,and that the lattice constant increased systematically with increasing Yb doping ratio.The doping effects of Yb on the thermoelectric properties were studied.It was found that Yb doping consistently decreased the electrical and thermal conductivities.On the other hand,the effects of Yb doping on the Seebeck coefficient were found to be non-monotonic.The magnitude of the Seebeck coefficient(n-type)was increased upon Yb doping up to x=0.02,above which Yb doping introduced notable p-type conduction.As a result,the room-temperature Seebeck coefficient of the x=0.10 sample became positive although the magnitude was not high.The thermoelectric figure of merit,ZT,reached a maximum of∼0.38 at 900 K for the x=0.01 sample.Selective doping on the Ni and Sn sites are necessary to further optimize the TE performance of Zr_(1−x)Yb_(x)NiSn alloys.

Hydrothermal synthesis of blue-emitting YPO4：Yb3＋ nanophosphor

The blue-emitting YPO4 phosphors doped with Yb3＋ were prepared by a simple hydrothermal method. All the products were characterized by XRD and TEM, which revealed that they were zircon structure with leaf-like morphology. According to the analysis of photoluminescence spectra, upon ultraviolet （275 nm） excitation, the Yb3＋ doped YPO4 phosphor showed an intense blue emission composed of two main bands at 420 and 620 nm assigned to charge transfer state （CTS） → 2Fs/2 and CTS →ZF7/2, respectively. Moreover, the optimum doping concentration of Yb3＋ in YPO4 phosphor was 1%, which exhibited the maximum emission intensity. The possible physical mechanism of concentration quenching was discussed, and the critical transfer distance determined to be 23.889 A. In particular, the color purity of the as-synthesized Yb3＋ doped YPO4 phosphor was as high as 83%, which made it an excellent candidate for blue-emitting materials.

Photonic properties of novel Yb3＋ doped germanium-lead oxyfluoride glass-ceramics for laser cooling applications

Abstract In recent years, our research group has developed and studied new rare-earth doped materials for the promising technology of solid-state laser cooling, which is based on anti-stokes fluorescence. To the best of our knowledge, our group is the only one in Canada leading the research into the properties of nanoparticles, glasses and glass-ceramics for optical refrigeration appli- cations. In the present work, optical properties of 50GeO2- 30PbF2-18PbO-2YbF3 glass-ceramics for laser cooling are presented and discussed as a function of crystallization temperature. Spectroscopic results show that samples have near infrared photoluminescence emission due to the 2F5/2 - 2F7/2 Yb3＋ transition, centered at -1016 nm with an excitation wavelength of 920 nm or 1011 nm, and the highest photoluminescence emission efficiency occurs for heat-treatment for 5 h at 350℃. The internal photolumi- nescence quantum yield varies between 99% and 80%, depending on the temperature of heat-treatment, being the most efficient under 1011 nm excitation. The 2F5/2 lifetime increases from 1.472 to 1.970 ms for heat treatments at 330℃ to 350℃, respectively, due to energy trapping and the low phonon energy of the nanocrystals. The sample temperature dependence was measured with a fiber Bragg grating sensor, as a function of input pump laser wavelength and processing temperature. These measure- ments show that the heating process approaches near zero for an excitation wavelength between 1020 and 1030 nm, which is an indication that phonons are removed effectivelly from the glass-ceramic materials, and they can be used for optical laser cooling applications. On theother hand, the temperature increase as a function of input laser power into samples remains constant between 920 and 980 nm wavelength excitation, a temperature variation of 36 K/W （temperature of 58℃/W） was attained under excitation at 950 nm, showing a possible use for biomedical applications to be explored.