Luminescence of pulsed laser deposited Eu doped yttrium oxide films

Europium doped yttrium oxide $({\mathrm{Eu:Y}}_{\mathrm{2}}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}})$ phosphor thin films were grown using a pulsed laser deposition (PLD) technique at varying growth conditions. The structural characterization carried out on a series of ${\mathrm{Eu:Y}}_{\mathrm{2}}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}$ films grown on (100) silicon at substrate temperatures in the range of 250–600 °C and oxygen pressure in the range of ${10}^{\text{−5}}\hspace{0.17em}\mathrm{Torr}$ to 200 mTorr indicated that films were preferentially (111) oriented. Measurements of photoluminescence and cathodoluminescence properties of laser deposited ${\mathrm{Eu:Y}}_{\mathrm{2}}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}$ thin films and powder used for laser target showed that the best in situ grown films were $\text{∼10\%–22\%}$ as bright as ${\mathrm{Eu:Y}}_{\mathrm{2}}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}$ powder. A postdeposition annealing treatment of ${\mathrm{Eu:Y}}_{\mathrm{2}}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}$ films led to further improvements in their brightness (up to $\text{∼70\%}$ with respect to ${\mathrm{Eu:Y}}_{\mathrm{2}}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}$ powder), with cluster sizes of $\text{<400\hspace{0.17em}}\mathrm{nm}.$