Green synthesis of rare earth doped ZrO2 NPs and its applications : Photo catalytic and Photoluminescence studies

The current trend applied in water purification has become one of the main challenges in sustainable development. Therefore, nanomaterials are used in photocatalytic degradation of organic pollutants.They have potential as efficient phosphors in display applications such as new flat panel displays with low-energy excitation sources, solar energy converters, optical amplifiers and thermoluminescent dosimeters. Rare-earth (RE) ions have been widely known as activators in different host matrices because of their high efficiency emission performance. Therefore the development of RE-ion-doped novel luminescent phosphors is of interest due to their potential applications in different optical display systems. Doping of metal ions and metal oxides in ZrO2 nanostructures can direct to effects like improvement of fluorescence and controlled excitonic recombination. Such flexibility in tuning the electronic level makes ZrO2 ideally suited for new device applications.