Ferroelectric polymers as PVDF has attracted great interest in photonic area because of the possibility to be usefull as hosts for rare-earth ions. However, their preparation parameters, as temperature and time of drying can influence the fluorescence of the samples. Although, few works can be found in the literature concerning the study of the fluorescence in ferroelectric materials. In this way, PVDF samples were doped with erbium oxide to verify the improvement in the optical fluorescence of the polymeric matrix. The FT-IR measurements confirmed the incorporation of dopant in the polymeric matrix host. The optical measurements in those samples shonw a dependence of fluorescence intensity as a function of the synthesis temperature. This behavior can be related to the losses of the ferroelectricity of PVDF as a function of the temperature. In summary, the experimental results revealed that the ferroelectric PVDF/Er is a potential candidate for optical and photonic applications.
We are grateful to the Brazilian Agencies, CAPES, CNPq (process 483683/2010-8 and 208232/2014-1), for the financial support of this work. E. A. Falcão also acknowledges UTSA and MeMDRL for hosting him under the NSF/INAMM and NSF ECCS 1002380 programs.