Temperature annealing dependence of structural, magnetic, and antibacterial properties of silver substituted cobalt ferrite nanoparticles produced by coprecipitation route

Abstract

In this study, silver-substituted cobalt ferrite (Ag0.02Co0.98Fe2O4) nanoparticles were successfully sensitized by the coprecipitation method. Annealing temperature treatment was used to modify the physical properties, i.e., 200 °C, 300 °C, 400 °C, and 500 °C. XRD analysis showed an increase in the annealing temperature, the crystallite size increased from 19.78 to 24.11 nm, and the grain size increased from 54.75 to 61.39 nm. The FTIR spectrum showed two prominent absorption bands around k ∼577 and k ∼381 cm−1, allowing metal oxide absorption in the tetrahedral and octahedral sites. There is a redistribution of cations which is more significant at the tetrahedral sites than at octahedral sites, toward a perfect spinel structure. An increased annealing temperature increased the saturation magnetization and coercive field from 31.80 to 50.60 emu g−1 and 651 to 1,077 Oe, respectively, attributable to an increase in the magnetocrystalline anisotropy constant. The evaluation of S. aureus and E. coli showed that Ag0.02Co0.98Fe2O4 indicated the zone of inhibition (ZOI) around the disks due to its antibacterial properties. The most significant on S.aureus and E.coli were 12.73 mm (mortality of 88%) and 12.43 mm (mortality of 80%), respectively, for Ag0.02Co0.98Fe2O4 annealed at 200 °C that have the minor grain size materials.