Chemical synthesis and magnetic study of nanocrystalline thin films of cobalt spinel ferrites

The sol-gel method was introduced to prepare the nanocrystalline thin films of cobalt spinel ferrite, which presents a convenient approach to perform the doping of foreign ions. The dependence of morphology and grain sizes of thus-obtained thin films on the annealing temperature were observed. Nanocrystalline thin films of CoFe2O4 have relatively lower magnetization than bulk phase and negative interactions between magnetic grains, the latter of which may be of significance to reduce the media noise for polycrystalline materials. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.