Effect of sintering temperature on structure, magnetic and magnetocaloric properties of La0.6Ca0.4MnO3 manganite

The effect of sintering temperature on the structure, magnetic transition and magnetic entropy of La0.6Ca0.4MnO3 manganite was studied. It was observed that this compound belongs to the orthorhombic structure with the Pnma space group without any impurity phase. The effect of sintering temperature on the Curie temperature (TC) was studied. The small increment in TC is found with increasing the sintering temperature. The magnetocaloric study exposes a quite large change of the magnetic entropy, which varies with sintering temperature. For an applied magnetic field of 3 T and sintering temperature of 1300 °C, the relative cooling power (RCP) is 89 J/kg. As a result, the studied compound can be considered as potential material for magnetic refrigeration near and below room temperature.