Room temperature ferromagnetism and dielectric properties of cobalt doped Tin Selenide for spintronic applications

Abstract

Doping can induce and tune many physical properties of a semiconductor host lattice. Here, we report the effect of cobalt doping on optical, dielectric, and magnetic properties of SnSe. We have synthesized Cobalt doped SnSe (CoxSn1-xSe) polycrystals with x = 0.00, 0.01, 0.03, 0.05, 0.10 and 0.20 using hydrothermal method. The single-phase was confirmed from X-ray Diffraction. Morphology of CoxSn1-xSe polycrystals was examined through Scanning Electron Microscope and it revealed a 3D flower-like morphology for undoped and CoxSn1-xSe till x = 0.05. The morphology changed to rod-like shapes for higher compositions of Co. The bandgaps of CoxSn1-xSe were reduced as determined from UV–Vis–NIR Diffuse Reflectance Spectroscopy. Dielectric properties of the samples were studied at room temperature in a frequency range from 100 Hz to 12 MHz. Vibrating Sample Magnetometer studies revealed the ferromagnetism for all the samples at room temperature. The results indicate the possible applications of the material in spintronic devices.