Luminescence and scintillation properties of Mg-codoped LuAG:Pr single crystals annealed in air

Abstract The influence of the Mg 2+ codoping and annealing in the air on the scintillation and luminescence characteristics of Pr-doped lutetium-aluminum garnet crystals (LuAG) was studied to find a possible positive effect of Pr 4+ . The overall scintillation efficiency under X-ray excitation of the annealed Pr- doped samples decreased with increasing Mg concentration. This was explained by increased overlap of the Pr 3+ 5d-4f emission with the charge-transfer (CT) absorption band of the Pr 4+ ion stabilized by Mg 2+ . This absorption caused even greater decrease of the light yield, as the light is collected from the whole sample volume in the pulse-height spectrum measurement. Electron ce…