Synthesis and characterization of oleylamine capped MnxFe1-xFe2O4 nanocomposite: Magneto-optical properties, cation distribution and hyperfine interactions

Abstract

Pure Fe3O4 NPs and Oleylamin (OAm) capped MnxFe1-xFe2O4 (MnxFe1-xFe2O4@OAm) (0.2 ≤ x ≤ 1.0) nanocomposites (NCs) were synthesized by the polyol route. Lattice parameter increases with increasing Mn2+ concentration, due to the respective larger ionic radius of Mn2+ ion compared with the Fe2+ ion. The VSM analyses revealed superparamagnetic characteristics of all samples. The extrapolated specific saturation magnetization (σs) values decreased from maximum 50.74 emu/g to minimum 15.34 emu/g by increasing Mn content. The particle size dependent Langevin function was applied to determine the magnetic particle dimensions (Dmag) between 9.10 nm and 21.50 nm. The observed magnetic moments of NPs and NCs are in range of (0.64–2.10) μB and significantly less than 4 μB of bulk Fe3O4. Magnetic anisotropy was determined as uniaxial and calculated effective anisotropy constants (Keff) are between 32.14 × 104 Erg/g and 8.71 × 104 Erg/g. The size dependent saturation magnetization suggests the existence of a magnetically dead layers around the magnetic cores for NCs between 0.72 nm and 1.29 nm. From 57Fe Mössbauer spectroscopy data, the variation in line width, isomer shift, quadrupole splitting and hyperfine magnetic field values on Mn2+ substitution have been determined. Although, the Mössbauer spectra for the sample x = 0.2 is composed of ferromagnetic sextets, paramagnetic doublet is also formed for other samples. The percent diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DR %) and Kubelka-Munk theory were used to specify the optical properties. The estimated optical band gap (Eg) values from Tauc plots are between 1.50 eV and 2.05 eV. Increasing Mn content in NCs increased the band gap at different magnitudes.