Infrared-to-visible and infrared-to-violet upconversion fluorescence of rare earth doped LaF_3 nanocrystals

This paper reports that hexagonal-phase LaF3：Yb0.20^3＋,Er0.02^3＋ and LaF3：Yb0.20^3＋, Tm0.02^3＋ nanocrystals （NCs） were synthesized via a hydrothermal method. The transmission electron microscopy, selected area electron diffraction, powder x-ray diffraction, and thermogravimetric analysis are used to characterize the NCs. Under 980 nm excitation, the Yb^3＋/Er^3＋ and Yb^3＋/Tm^3＋ codoped NCs colloidal solutions present bright green and blue upconversion fluorescence, respectively. These NCs show efficient infrared-to-violet and infrared-to-visible upconversion. The upconversion fluo- rescence mechanisms of LaF2：Yb0.20^3＋, Er0.02^3＋ and LaF3：Yb0.20^3＋,Tm0.02^3＋ NCs are investigated with a 980-nm diode laser as excitation source.

Phase transformation and morphology tuning of β-NaYF_4:Yb^(3+),Er^(3+) nanocrystals through K^+ ions codoping

In this work, a simple method to modulate the crystal phase and morphology with a large amount of K＋ions codoping is proposed. The phase changes to the mixture of β-Na YF4 and β-KYF4 with increasing the content of K^＋ions to 80 mol%.When it exceeds 80 mol%, β-Na YF4 disappears gradually and β-KYF4 dominates with a poor crystalline. In addition, the morphology changes from nanosphere to nanoplate, and then to nanoprism, which indicates that a higher content of K^＋ions favors the growth rates along [0001] than the [10-10] of the nanocrystals. Additionally, the upconversion（UC） luminescence properties and the ratio of red/green（R/G） UC intensity of samples with different phases and morphologies are detected,which makes it possible to tune the UC fluorescence by varying the concentration of K^＋ions.

High value-added fluorescence upconversion agents-assisted nanosemiconductors for efficient wide spectral response photocatalysis:Exerting energy transfer effect and applications

The design of the photocatalytic materials has made a great of remarkable progress in the area of the enhancement photocatalytic activity,but there are still lots of problems such as wide band gap,low utilization of sunlight,low quantum efficiency and poor stability,which further limit the extensive practical applications.Thus,it is a hot research topic and key scientific problem to be solved that how to design and prepare the catalysts,which can respond to visible and near-infrared light in sunlight.Inspired by efficient nonlinear optical upconversion materials,upconversion-based nanocomposites can indirectly broaden the absorption ranges of semiconductors by co nverting the captured long-band visible and near-infrared incident light into high-energy short-band visible or ultraviolet light,which can be adopted as the promising candidate in wide-spectral-light-activating photocatalytic materials coupling with conventional semiconductors.According to our recent works and literature reports,recent review summarizes the research progress of photocatalytic materials with upconversion effect on photolysis of water for hydrogen production,degradation of organic and inorganic pollutants,reduction of CO_(2) and photodynamic therapy.The prepared nanocomposites can suppress the recombination of electrons and holes,and greatly improve the photocatalytic efficiency by the synergistic effect.It maybe stimulates a great interest in rational design and preparation of efficient full-spectrum photocatalytic systems and their wide application in solar energy conversion.

Controlled Assembly of Gold and Rare-Earth Upconversion Nanoparticles for Ratiometric Sensing Applications

In this paper, the Au nanoparticles and rare-earth （RE） upconversion nanoparticles （NPs） were respectively synthesized by using polyelectrolyte as the capping agents. Since the synthesized Au NPs and RE NPs had the similar size and surface conditions, Their mixture were employed in a pH sensing application. Benefited from the good spectral overlap between the RE upconversion emission bands and pH-tunable surface plasmon bands of the Au NPs, the pH-induced manipulation of green-to-red emission intensity ratio of the upconversion fluorescence was achieved in the Au-RE mixture. The results demonstrate a rapid ratiometric approach for pH sensing, which is more efficient than traditional sensing methods that depend on single intensity-based responses to analytes.