Cation Distribution and Temperature Dependence of Brillouin Function for Nickel-Substituted Manganese–Zinc Ferrites

Abstract

Ni-substituted manganese–zinc (MnZn) ferrites with the composition of Mn0.506– x Zn0.244Ni x Fe2.250O4.0 ( $x = 0.066{\sim}0.122$ ) have been prepared by the solid-state reaction method. The cation distribution has been investigated by the Rietveld refinement of X-ray diffraction patterns, the microstructure has been observed using a scanning electron microscope, and the magnetic property has been measured using superconductor quantum interference devices and $B$ – $H$ analyzer. The results show that Zn2+ and Ni2+ ions prefer to occupy the tetrahedron site (A sublattice) and octahedron site (B sublattice), respectively. However, Mn2+ and Fe3+ ions can enter into A and B sublattices, where the ratio of Mn2+ ions occupying A and B sublattices is 4:1. The lattice parameter ( $a$ ) of the samples decreases with the increase of Ni-substituted content. Meanwhile, based on the Neel model of collinear-spin ferrimagnetism, the molecular-field coefficients $\omega _{\rm AA}$ , $\omega _{\rm BB}$ , and $\omega _{\rm AB}$ of the Ni-substituted MnZn ferrites have been calculated, and the magnetic moment of A and B sublattices versus temperature $T$ has also been investigated. The fitting results match well with the experimental data. Both $\omega _{\rm AB}$ and $\omega _{\rm BB}$ increase with the increase of the Ni-substituted content, but $\omega _{\rm AA}$ shows the opposite variation trend. The Curie temperature also increases with the increasing of the Ni-substituted content, which is attributed to the enhancement of superexchange interaction for A–B sublattice. In addition, the temperature dependence of initial permeability and core loss has been discussed.