Spectroscopic studies on Pr³⁺ doped YPO₄ and LuPO₄ upon vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) and synchrotron radiation excitation

This work concerns the spectroscopic properties of micro-and nanoscale LuPO4:Pr3+ and microscale YPO4:Pr3+ upon excitation by VUV synchrotron radiation at a wide range of energies (5-45 eV) and two different tem-peratures (7 and 300 K). Both Pr3+ doped host materials show more intense UV-C emission than other Pr3+ phosphors studied earlier at FinEstBeAMS beamline under the same measurement conditions. The various relaxation processes of 5d(1)4f(1) -> 4f(2) interconfigurational transitions of Pr3+ and the difference between both hosts are discussed in detail.