Intense red emission from highly elastic and thermally stable phosphate glass doped with Ce, Nd, and Ce/Nd ions.

Red emitting materials are critical to a wide range of optoelectronic devices, such as displays, lasers, and light-emitting diodes. Ongoing research efforts are focused on enhancing their emission efficiency and improving their thermal and mechanical stability to meet the demands of advanced device applications. Accordingly, a host glass network with the composition 50PO-20ZnO-20BiO-10BaO (PZBB) was proposed and reinforced with 1 mol% of Ce, Nd, or Ce/Nd ions to produce efficient red emission with high thermal and mechanical stability. Structural changes due to compositional variations were analyzed via X-ray diffraction (XRD), density measurements, and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. These analyses revealed a high network tightness with a very slight increase with the introduction of Ce, Nd, or Ce/Nd ions. The produced host PZBB and developed PZBBCe, PZBBNd, or PZBBCe-Nd glasses exhibited high thermal stability and elasticity, confirming their potential for use in optoelectronic device applications. Distinctive absorption bands of Ce and Nd ions were detected across the 200-2500 nm spectral range. Excitation of the PZBBCe, PZBBNd, or PZBBCe-Nd glasses at 308 nm resulted in red emission at 619 & 639 nm, 616 & 677 nm, or 626 nm, respectively. Oscillator strength, Judd-Ofelt, and gain analyses confirm the suitability of PZBBCe, PZBBNd, and PZBBCe-Nd for efficient red emission applications. Gain cross section analysis reveals that PZBBCe-Nd glass supports broadband and dual-ion emission, with potential energy transfer enhancing Nd³⁺-dominated red emission output, while Ce (PZBBCe) and Nd (PZBBNd) singly doped glasses show broad and selective gain, respectively-highlighting their suitability for tunable and narrow-linewidth red emission applications. Overall, the PZBBCe, PZBBNd, or PZBBCe-Nd glasses demonstrated high photoluminescence efficiency in the red region, along with excellent thermal stability and elasticity, making them promising candidates for single- and dual-wavelength optoelectronic applications.