Research on Optical Property of Black-Colored Zirconia Ceramics by Photoluminescence, Raman and Visible Reflectivity Spectra

White color zirconia ceramics were produced by sintering of coprecipitated 3Y-TZP powder in air. By annealing at reducing atmosphere, black-color zirconia ceramics with different shades were then realized. The obtained ZrO2 samples were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), UV-visible spectrum (UV-vis), photoluminescence spectra (PL) and Raman spectroscopy, respectively. UV-visible spectrum reveals that the ZrO2 samples under different reducing atmosphere have different reflectivity in 400-800nm. X-ray diffraction data confirms that the different annealing processes can result in the change of the corresponding crystal density. It is indicated that defects contributes to cell volume alteration. The PL and Raman spectra further indicates that these defects belong to oxygen vacancies and the concentration of oxygen vacancies have a strong influence on the shades of black-color zirconia ceramics.