Influence of Silver Nanoparticles on the Spectroscopic Properties of Sm3+ Doped Boro-phosphate Glasses

The Sm3+ doped novel boro-phosphate glasses containing silver nanoparticles (NPs) (SmBPxA) have been prepared following the melt quenching technique and their structural and spectroscopic behavior were studied through HR-TEM, optical absorption and photoluminescence spectral measurements. The TEM analysis validates the existence of Ag NPs with an average diameter of similar to 8 nm. The Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) band of silver NPs was found at around 600 nm from the absorption spectrum of the Sm3+ ions free glass sample. The optical band gap energy (Eopt) corresponding to the direct and indirect allowed transitions and the Urbach energy (E) values were determined from the absorption spectral measurements. The luminescence intensity is found to get enhance when the Ag NPs were embedded along with the Sm3+ ions in the prepared glasses due to the local electric field effect around the rare earth (RE) ion site produced by the SPR of Ag NPs.