The kinetics of exciton photoluminescence in mercuric iodide

Time-resolved photoluminescence (TRPL) of red mercuric iodide single crystal is measured at low temperatures and its two-photon luminescence is measured at room temperature. Sharp near band-gap luminescence is observed around 530 nm and was ascribed to radiative annihilation of free and bound excitons; the phonon replica of exciton luminescence are found between 533 and 540 nm at low temperatures. TRPL experiment reveals that near band-gap luminescence comprises fast and slow decay components and shows the different relaxation processes between free and bound exciton annihilation. Luminescence of bound excitons steeply lowers with increasing temperature and disappears about 40 K. A luminescence tail band is observed around 540 nm that is ascribed to defects in the anion sublattice. The temporal behavior of the tail band is described by rate equations very well. A broad luminescent band appears at 630 nm. The decay curves suggest that the luminescence is ascribed to the radiative recombination of donor-acceptor pairs and there are two kinds of mechanisms to control the decay. At room temperature, a luminescent band appears at the band-gap region, which shows the band-gap at room temperature is about 2.125 eV.