Abstract
For years, researchers have been exploring effective methods of sustaining the emission intensity of phosphors with increasing temperature by suppressing emission loss. In this work, we developed a multi-cationic site and lattice-distorted phosphosilicate phosphor, Ca(8)Al(2)P(6)SiO(28):Ce, Eu. To obtain luminous-self-healing properties, we attempted to change the energy depths and density distributions of the traps to achieve self-suppression of emission loss by energy compensation from the traps or energy transfer between Ce(3+) and Eu(2+)/Eu(3+). The temperature-dependent emission spectra indicate that the luminescence of Ce(3+) presents similar change trends in both single and co-doped samples. Meanwhile, the change trends of the Eu(2+)/Eu(3+) emission intensities show obvious differences. Combined with the thermoluminescence curves, decay times, temperature-dependent fluorescence characteristics and cathodoluminescence spectra, we speculate that the traps play an important role in the luminescence of Ce(3+) due to the smaller energy difference of the Ce(3+) excited states and the conduction band. The abnormal luminescence of Eu(2+)/Eu(3+) mainly results from the energy transfer of Ce(3+) to Eu(2+)/Eu(3+). For this phenomenon, a high thermal sensitive fluorescence intensity ratio is obtained in a broad temperature range, which implies that this material can be applied in temperature sensors.