Magnetic properties of cobalt ferrite octahedrons obtained from calcination of granular nanotubes growing on bacterial nanocellulose

Abstract

We present an in-depth magnetic study of polycrystalline, microstain-free, magnetic, and thermally stable cobalt ferrite (CoFe2O4) octahedrons with an edge dimension of 214 nm. Nanoparticles were synthesized from granular CoFe2O4 nanotubes growing on bacterial nanocellulose and annealed at T = 1273 K. SEM, XRD, and VSM were used to investigate the morphology, structure and magnetic properties of the octahedral particles. The results indicate that heat treatment increases the sizes of the crystallites (2 times) and of the particles (4 times), compared with the starting material. The particles show a change of the magnetization saturation and magnetic anisotropy around 150 K compared with canonical ferrimagnetic materials, associated with a First Order Magnetization Process. The magnetization process as a function of temperature, cooling without (ZFC) and with (FC) different applied magnetic fields are explained by multi-domain theory. ZFC-FC curves show an irreversible branching temperature, which is highly sensitive to the applied magnetic field. In contrast, the temperature for the maximal magnetization value in the ZFC curves, change slightly with the external applied magnetic field, H.