The interest in lanthanide-containing organic-inorganic hybrids has grown considerably during the last decade with the concomitant fabrication of materials with tuneable attributes and offering modulated properties. The potential of these materials relies on the possibility of fully exploiting the synergy between the intrinsic characteristics of sol–gel derived hosts (e.g. highly controlled purity, versatile shaping and patterning, excellent optical quality, easy control of the refractive index ; photosensitivity, encapsulation of large amounts of emitting centres isolated from each other and protected by the host) and the luminescence features of trivalent lanthanide ions (Ln3+) (e.g. high luminescence quantum yield, relatively-narrow and long lived emission, large Stokes shifts, ligands sensitization of Ln3+ luminescence).
Promising applications may be envisaged, such as light-emitting devices, active waveguides in the visible and IR spectral regions, active coatings, and bio-medical actuators and sensors, opening up exciting directions in materials science and related technologies with significant implications in the nanotechnological processing (e.g. integration, miniaturization and multifunctionalization) of devices. This talk intends to provide an overview of the latest advances in the domain of Ln3+-containing hybrid materials, addressing particular attention to the discussion of the possible different synthesis strategies, the photoluminescence features, the empirical determination of the radiative and non-radiative transition rates, excited state quantum efficiency, overall emission quantum yield, Ω2,4,6 intensity parameters, and the quantitative description of host-to-Ln3+ energy transfer processes. A summary includes a view of future requirements, aims, and trends of this fascinating area.