ZnO glass-ceramics: An alternative way to produce semiconductor materials

Fabrication of transparent glass-ceramics containing ZnO nanocrystallites has been reported. The obtained material shows UV-excited photoluminescence consisting of both broad emission in the visible region and the free exciton emission at 3.28 eV. Since the observed emission depends on the precipitated state of ZnO in the glass matrix, the glass-ceramics obtained by this way will give an alternative selection of semiconductor material with unique optical and electronic functions.