Studies on the dielectric and magnetic properties of neodymium-doped nickel ferrite for microwave absorption

Neodymium-doped nickel spinel ferrite, NiNdxFe2-xO4 (x = 0.00, 0.02, 0.04, 0.06) nanoparticles are synthesized by adopting the sol gel method. The formation of pure phase nickel ferrite is confirmed through XRD analysis. Neodymium is doped to tune the structural, magnetic, and morphological properties of nickel spinel ferrite nanoparticles. The 'as synthesized' undoped nanoparticles show the spherical shaped morphology with an average particle size ranging from 145 to 150 nm. It has been observed that the average particle size decreases with increasing the doping concentration of neodymium in nickel spinel ferrite. The effect of substituting the Fe3+ ions with Nd3+ ions on the electromagnetic properties of the developed material are also investigated using vector network analyzer. The nickel spinel ferrite with the doping concentration of x = 0.06 shows the best impedance matching with free space having normalized impedance matching of 0.96. The maximum attenuation constant of 78.51 is observed for NiNdxFe2-xO4 (x = 0.06). The reflection loss is measured with in a frequency ranging from 8.2 to 12.4 GHz. The maximum reflection loss of - 13.76 dB at 9.28 GHz for NiNdxFe2-xO4 (x = 0.06) is observed for the pellet of thickness 2.9 mm. The present study reveals that the neodymium-doped nickel spinel ferrite is the budding aspirant for microwave absorption application in X-Band.