Observation of low field microwave absorption in co-doped ZnO system

• Low field microwave absorption (LFMA) signal observed in TM co-doped ZnO samples.
• LFMA peaks and hysteresis matche with hysteresis loop and the anisotropy fields at RT.
• At low temperature of 10 K matching between LFMA and hysteresis loop does not survive.
• Possible cross over from AHE to OHE domination as cause of collapse at low temperature.
• Absence of LFMA signals in rare earth co-doped ZnO system.

Room temperature low field microwave absorption (LFMA) in magnetic materials find application in microwave absorbers and low field sensors. However not all the magnetic materials show LFMA and the phenomenon is not fully understood. We report on the observation of low field microwave absorption (LFMA) or the non-resonant microwave absorption (NRMA) in the transition metal (TM) co-doped ZnO samples of the composition Zn1−x(TM:TM)xO synthesized by solid state reaction technique. LFMA peaks and hysteresis matches very well with that of the magnetization hysteresis loop and the anisotropy fields at room temperature similar to the reports in the literature for other magnetic systems. However we show through our careful experiments that such a correlation between LFMA and the magnetization does not survive at low temperatures and particularly at 10 K the LFMA hysteresis collapses in our TM co-doped ZnO system; whereas the magnetization hysteresis loop becomes very big and anisotropy field becomes bigger in the range of kOe. We interpret the LFMA as field dependent surface impedance or eddy current losses, in terms of a possible role of anomalous hall resistivity that follows magnetization and the ordinary hall resistivity that only follows the applied field. We then argue that LFMA accordingly follows magnetization or applied field when AHE or OHE dominates respectively. Also we confirm the absence of LFMA signals in the rare earth co-doped ZnO system.