Oxygen Vacancy-Related Cathodoluminescence Quenching and Polarons in CeO(2)

[Image: see text] We used cathodoluminescence (CL) spectroscopy to characterize the oxygen vacancies (V(O)) in ceria (CeO(2)). The effects of the processing atmosphere and thermal quenching temperature on the nature and distribution of the intrinsic defects and on the spectroscopic behavior were investigated. The presence of polarons and associates of the polarons with the oxygen vacancies such as (V(O)(••)–Ce(Ce)(′))(•) is demonstrated. CL intensity quenching above a critical concentration of V(O) has been shown. Even though the emission centers in all samples are the same, their concentration changes with the oxygen partial pressure of the processing atmosphere. Deconvolution of the observed CL spectra shows that the emissions originating from the F(0) centers prevail over those of F(+) centers of V(O) when the defect concentration is high.