Concentration dependence of upconversion luminescence of Er3+/Yb3+ in the fluorophosphate glasses with small phosphates content

Abstract Frequency upconversion into green and red luminescence in fluorophosphate glasses doped with Er3+ ions (1021 to 1016 ion/cm3) and Yb3+ ions (1021 ion/cm3) while pumped with a 970 nm diode laser is presented. The red upconversion emission results from a two-photon excitation process. The upconversion emission intensity dependence on the incident pump power shows that the green upconversion luminescence arising from 2H11/2 level is also contributed by the two-photon processes. The values of n-parameter for the 4S3/2 level change from 2.7 to 2.0 during low power excitation and continue decreasing at higher pumping energy. It has been shown that the green upconversion luminescence intensity dependence on the erbium ions content has a sharp maximum at the concentration of 2* 1019 ion/cm3. We attribute the high upconversion luminescence in case of low Er3+ and Tm3+ ions concentrations (about 1018–1016 ion/cm3) to the cooperative energy transfer from Yb–Yb* dimers. The formation of excited dimers is confirmed experimentally by cooperative luminescence band at 495 nm.