https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-020-00112-5
Regular Article
Correlations between microstructural and magnetic properties of Gd3+-doped spinel ferrite nanoparticles
Department of Physics, National Institute of Technology Patna, Patna, Bihar, 800005, India
* e-mail: samrat.udc@gmail.com
Received:
11
September
2019
Accepted:
3
January
2020
Published online:
10
January
2020
We report the effect of rare-earth Gd3+ doping in Ni–Zn ferrite nanoparticles with a generic formula Zn0.2Ni0.8Gd x Fe2–x O4 (x = 0.00, 0.05, 0.10 and 0.15), synthesized using chemical co-precipitation technique. The cubic spinel phase formation and phase purity were confirmed using X-ray diffraction with crystallite size in the range of 16 ± 7 nm obtained from Scherrer’s formula and Williamson–Hall (W–H) plots analysis. The lowering of octahedral cubic symmetry was also observed from Raman spectra with increasing Gd3+ ions content. Increase in Gd3+ ions concentration results in enhancement of A–O–B superexchange magnetic interaction, confirmed by hysteresis curves at 5 K. The room temperature M–H plots showed superparamagnetic behavior due to small particle size. The blocking temperature was found to decrease with increase in Gd3+ ions concentration in Ni–Zn ferrite nanoparticles, which makes it a potential candidate for biomedical applications such as targeted drug delivery and hyperthermia.
© Società Italiana di Fisica (SIF) and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature, 2020