Precise synthesis of polymorphic
phases with similar components
but distinct crystal structures is one of the key problems in inorganic
chemistry. In this work, we report a fluorination method adopting
ZrO2 as the starting material and NH4F as the
fluoridation agent that can afford multiphases in the Zr–O–F
system, including Zr7O9F10, Zr3O2F8, ZrO0.46F3.08, ZrO0.33F3.33, β-ZrF4, NH4Zr2F9, and NH4ZrF5. A preliminary phase formation diagram was established as a function
of the fluorination temperature (T), reaction time
(t), and F/Zr ratio after systematic optimization
of the preparation conditions. Among the as-obtained phases, the detailed
crystal structures of Zr7O9F10 and
ZrO0.33F3.33 were refined based on the powder
X-ray diffraction patterns. As the F/O ratio increases, the crystal
structures of Zr–O–F phases transform gradually from
an anion-deficient α-UO3-related structure of Zr7O9F10 to an anion-excess ReO3-related structure of ZrO0.33F3.33. At last,
we also prepared Ti-doped ZrO2, Zr7O9F10, ZrO0.46F3.08, and ZrO0.33F3.33 to study the host-lattice-dependent photoluminescence
properties of zirconium oxyfluorides. The four materials show distinct
photoluminescence in the UV and visible regions due to different local
coordination environments of Zr/Ti. This work demonstrates the low-temperature
fluorination method as an efficient route to phase-selective polymorphic
metal oxyfluorides, which can be employed in further structure–property
relationship studies.