Physical and magnetic properties of Mn–Zr doped La–Sr ferrite prepared by the auto-combustion route

This is the first report ever on (Mn2+–Zr4+) doped M-type lanthanum strontium hexaferrite with general formula, Sr0.85La0.15(MnZr)xFe12−2xO19 where x=0.0, 0.25, 0.50, 0.75, and 1.0, prepared by citrate auto-combustion method. These ferrites were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning electron microscope (SEM), Energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) and Vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM). X-ray diffraction patterns show the formation of high purity hexaferrite phase without other secondary phases for all the synthesized samples. It was observed from magnetic hysteresis data that the coercive force is reduced from 5692.5 Oe to 1669.2 Oe with increase in doping contents but the net magnetization of the samples varies slightly from 60.6 to 55.2 emu/gm. High saturation magnetization (Ms), low coercivity (Hc) and remanence magnetization (Mr) values of these materials make them particularly suitable for data recording.