Spectroscopic investigations of nanostructured LiNbO3 doped with Eu3+

Structural and optical properties of the sol–gel derived nanocrystalline lithium niobate (LiNbO3) powders doped with Eu3+ ions have been studied. In particular, the influence of the sizes of nanoparticles controlled by temperature on the structural and luminescence properties has been investigated. Emission bands corresponding to 5D0 emission became more resolved with increasing nanocrystal size and changed to a typical Eu3+:LiNbO3 single crystal spectrum for nanocrystals having an average size of more than 40 nm. Nonlinear optical properties of nanostructured LiNbO3 have been confirmed by simple observation of second harmonic generation effect (SHG). The possibility of using nanostructured LiNbO3 doped with rare-earth ions as self-doubling elements in integrated optoelectronic devices has been discussed.