Abstract
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•Highly aqueous soluble luminescent YPO4:Tb (core), YPO4:Tb@LaPO4 (Core/shell) and YPO4:Tb@LaPO4@SiO2 (core/shell/Si) nanorods.•A facile synthesis process for preparation of lanthanide nanorods.•Luminescent nanorods show porous and high solubility in polar and nonpolar solvents.•The epitaxial growth of inert LaPO4 shell and further amorphous silica, respectively, enhanced their optical and luminescence properties, which is highly usable for luminescent biolabeling, and optical bio-probe etc.
Highly crystalline, luminescent YPO4:Tb (core), YPO4:Tb@LaPO4 (core/shell) nanorods (NRs) were prepared by urea based co-precipitation process at low temperature. The synthesis method involves important advantages such as its simplicity, low-cost precursor, eco-friendly, rapidness and high reaction yields. X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, energy dispersive-x-ray analysis, FTIR, UV/vis, excitation and emission spectral techniques were employed to investigate the crystals structure, crystallinity, morphology, surface chemistry, optical and photoluminescence properties of the as-prepared samples. The silica surface coating was verified from EDX and FTIR spectral studies. TEM micrograph indicates the well crystalline, irregular size rod-shaped nanostructures, which were covered with a porous thin silica layer. The emission spectra were dominated by a 5D4→7F5 transition in all three samples, but the core/shell nanostructured shows strongest emission intensity because of reduction in nonradiative transition rate. Silica-modified core/shell/Si NRs exhibits high solubility with good colloidal stability in respect to core/shell NRs due to the influence of optically active silica. The morphological, nanostructural, high solubility in an aqueous solvent along with strong green photoluminescence makes them a suitable candidate for biomedical applications.