Gonell F, Botas AMP, Brites CDS, Amorós P, Carlos LD, Julián-López B, Ferreira RAS. Aggregation-induced heterogeneities in the emission of upconverting nanoparticles at the submicron scale unfolded by hyperspectral microscopy.
NANOSCALE ADVANCES 2019;
1:2537-2545. [PMID:
36132713 PMCID:
PMC9418934 DOI:
10.1039/c8na00412a]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/21/2018] [Accepted: 04/28/2019] [Indexed: 05/23/2023]
Abstract
Transparent upconverting hybrid nanocomposites are exciting materials for advanced applications such as 3D displays, nanosensors, solar energy converters, and fluorescence biomarkers. This work presents a simple strategy to disperse upconverting β-NaYF4:Yb3+/Er3+ or Tm3+ nanoparticles into low cost, widely used and easy-to-process polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)-based organic-inorganic hybrids. The upconverting hybrids were shaped as monoliths, films or powders displaying in the whole volume Tm3+ or Er3+ emissions (in the violet/blue and green/red spectral regions, respectively). For the first time, hyperspectral microscopy allows the identification at the submicron scale of differences in the hybrids' emission colour, due to variations in the relative intensity of the distinct components of the upconversion spectrum. The effect is attributed to the size distribution of the agglomerates of nanoparticles, highlighting the importance of studying the emission at submicron scales, since this effect is not observable in measurements recorded in larger areas.
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