LAUSR

Abstract In this work, we found the significant improvement of photoluminescence of zinc tungstate doped with potassium salts. The samples were prepared by solid-state reaction using ZnO, WO 3 , KNO 3 , K 2 SO 4 , and KCl as starting powders. The powders were mixed with the molar ratios of ZnO: WO 3 : potassium salts = 1: 1: x and sintered at 800 °C for 3 h in air. The emission peak of photoluminescence excited at 275 nm was observed at 465 nm. With increasing potassium salts content, the intensity increased reached its maximum at x = 0.02 and decreased. The tendency of the luminescence intensity for KCl doping was almost the same as KNO 3 doping, whereas, for K 2 SO 4 doping, the tendency of the decrease was less steep than other doping. The order of each maximum intensity was KNO 3 >K 2 SO 4 >KCl. It was considered that K replacing Zn in the crystal lattice enhanced the intrinsic luminescence in the blue wavelength region. Moreover, different anions doping had the different effect of the enhancement of the luminescence.