Novel yellowish-green light-emitting Ca10(PO4)6O:Ce(3+) phosphor: structural refinement, preferential site occupancy and color tuning.

Here we report a novel Ca10(PO4)6O:Ce(3+) phosphate phosphor, consisting of an apatite structure, whose emission peaks under excitation with near-ultra violet light were found to shift from 410 nm (blue light) to 510 nm (yellowish-green light) with an increasing Ce(3+) doping level due to the Ce(3+) at the different concentrations preferentially occupying different crystallographic sites.