Effect of Substitution of Mn, Cu, and Zr on the Structural, Magnetic, and Ku-Band Microwave-Absorption Properties of Strontium Hexaferrite Nanoparticles

The ferrites with the compositions of SrMnxCuxZr2xFe(12-4x)O19 (x = 0.0, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, and 0.5) are synthesized by the coprecipitation method. The formation of M-type hexaferrite is confirmed by x-ray diffraction (XRD) and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) analyses. The morphology of the samples is shown by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) microscopy. Vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) analysis has been used for the investigation of the magnetic properties, and the reason for the changes in the magnetic properties as a result of doping, are expressed. The values of coercivity decrease by increasing the amount of substitution, which could be related to the modification of anisotropy form the c-axis toward the c-plane. Finally, we have used vector network analysis to investigate the microwave absorption properties. We find that the samples with the composition of SrMn0.4Cu0.4Zr0.8Fe10.4O19 have the largest reflection loss and the widest bandwidth among these samples.