Bright photon upconversion on composite organic lanthanide molecules through localized thermal radiation

• Main Authors: Ye, Huanqing, Bogdanov, Viktor, Liu, Sheng, Vajandar, Saumitra, Osipowicz, Thomas, Hernández, Ignacio, Xiong, Qihua
• Other Authors: School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2020
• Subjects: Science::Physics; Radiation; Luminescence
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/140364
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Converting low-energy photons via thermal radiation can be a potential approach for utilizing infrared (IR) photons to improve photovoltaic efficiency. Lanthanide-containing materials have achieved great progress in IR-to-visible photon upconversion (UC). Herein, we first report bright photon, tunable wavelength UC through localized thermal radiation at the molecular scale with low excitation power density (<10 W/cm2) realized on lanthanide complexes of perfluorinated organic ligands. This is enabled by engineering the pathways of nonradiative de-excitation and energy transfer in a composite of ytterbium and terbium perfluoroimidodiphosphinates. The IR-excited thermal UC and wavelength control is realized through the terbium activators sensitized by the ytterbium sensitizers having high luminescence efficiency. The metallic molecular composite thus can be a potential energy material in the use of the IR solar spectrum for thermal photovoltaic applications.