A New Blue-Emitting Mg2Al4Si5O18:Ce3+ Phosphor for White Light Emitting Diodes

A series of blue-emitting Mg2Al4Si5O18:Ce3+ phosphors were prepared via the conventional high temperature solid-state reaction method. The phase structure, photoluminescence (PL) properties, PL thermal stability, and fluorescence decay curves of the samples were investigated for the first time. Under excitation at 365 nm, the phosphor exhibited a broad band blue emission with peak at 440 nm, which was ascribed to the 4f --> 5d transition of Ce3+, and the color coordinate was (0.1602, 0.0849). When the temperature increased to 150 °C, the luminescence intensity of the Mg2Al4Si5O18:0.06Ce3+ phosphor was 55.73% of the initial value at room temperature. The activation energy ΔE was calculated to be 0.25 eV, which proved the good thermal stability of the sample. The energy transfer critical distance between Ce3+ ions in Mg2Al4Si5O18 host were also calculated. The above results indicate that the Mg2Al4Si5O18:Ce3+ is a promising candidate as a blue-emitting near ultraviolet convertible phosphor for application in white light emitting diodes (WLEDs).