Synergistic enhancement of Eu³⁺-doped LaAlO₃ fluorescent materials by sol-gel process and aerogel structure for high power and precise transmission illumination

In recent years, the optical synergistic optimization effect brought by porous structure has been gradually reported, and aerogel, as a typical representative of the three-dimensional network structure of gas-solid, also has potential application prospects. In view of this, a series of LaAlO₃:xEu³⁺ (x=0.0–5.0 %) aerogel fluorescent materials were successfully synthesized by sol-gel and heat treatment, using the network skeleton of aerogel as the fluorescent substrate. The corresponding phosphors were prepared by a typical high-temperature solid-state method, and the two types of samples were compared by various characterization methods and test methods. The results show that due to the synergistic gain brought by the sol-gel process and the nanopore structure, the aerogel fluorescent materials display significant advantages over the phosphor in terms of phase and performance, with higher fluorescence intensity and nearly twice the fluorescence lifetime. Based on the optimal doping ratio (X=2.0 %), the application potential of the aerogel fluorescent material was further evaluated against that of the phosphor, which showed superior thermal stability and PLQY. The luminescence intensity of the S-LAE2 at 428 K is still more than 50 % of the initial value, and the chromaticity shift ΔE at 478 K is only 1.7×10⁻⁴, which is much smaller than G-LAE2 and the reported fluorescent materials. Meanwhile, S-LAE2 exhibited much greater PLQY than G-LAE2 (26.45 %). Finally, based on the excellent application potential of aerogel fluorescent materials, S-LAE2 was packaged into W-LED with commercial UV chips and blue/green phosphors, which emit ideal warm white light with excellent CIE (0.3829,0.3843), CCT (3988 K) and CRI (84.6). Upon increasing the driving current up to 320 mA, the device still maintains excellent stability. This series of results show the high competitiveness of aerogel fluorescent materials in the fields of high-power luminescence and precise light conversion, and also show their excellent application potential as fluorescent materials in the future.