Studies of structural, magnetic and dielectric properties of X-type Barium Zinc hexaferrite Ba2Zn2Fe28O46 powder prepared by combustion treatment method using ginger root extract as a green reducing agent

Various quantities of ginger (Zingiber officinale) root extract were used to prepare X-type Barium-Zinc hexaferrite with the chemical composition Ba2Zn2Fe28O46. The powders were prepared using a combustion treatment method, being pre-heated at 550 degrees C for 4 h with the ginger as a fuel, followed by final heating to 900 degrees C for 5 h and natural cooling to room temperature to obtain Ba2Zn2Fe28O46 hexagonal ferrite powder. The phase composition of heated powder samples was investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), indicating the formation of a mixture of X-type and hematite (alpha-Fe2O3). Up to 82.6%, X-ferrite was formed at 900 degrees C with 52.5 g of ginger root extract. Dielectric analysis of the prepared samples shows the frequency-dependent phenomena. All samples were hard magnets, with coercivity values (H-C) between 262.2 and 318.3 kAm(-1), and squareness ratios > 0.5. The sample prepared with 52.5 g ginger root extract possesses the highest value of saturation magnetisation (M-S = 33.87 Am-2 kg(-1)) in comparison with the other prepared samples. Therefore, ginger was shown to be a useful natural plant extract as a reducing fuel for the low-temperature synthesis of X-ferrites. The sample prepared with 35 g ginger root extract shows a broad loss tangent resonance peak between 10 kHz and 100 kHz, while other samples show loss tangent resonance peaks between 300 kHz and 2MHz frequency range. (C) 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.