Structural and magnetic properties of Mn-doped ZnO powders

A mixture of bi(acetylacetonato) zinc(II)hydrate and tris(acetylacetonato) manganese(III) complexes was thermally co-dissociated to synthesize Mn-doped ZnO powders. In order to examine the effect of oxygen vacancies on the ferromagnetic coupling of Mn ions, two preparation routes were used: in route (I) the preparation was done in an open environment, whereas in route (II) the preparation was done in a closed environment. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) and the X-ray fluorescence (XRF) measurements indicate that the Mn content in the three samples are 3.9% (I), 3.3% (II) and 4.2% (II). The XRD results showed that the Mn ions were incorporated in the ZnO crystal and that a Zn_1−xMn_xO solid solution has formed. The magnetic characterization indicated that only samples prepared via route (II) exhibited a room temperature ferromagnetic component of magnetization. Furthermore, magnetic analysis showed that the magnetic moment per dopant ion in the samples examined was in the range of 4.2-6.1 μ_B/Mn. The percentages of coupled Mn atoms to the total number of Mn atoms were found to be extremely small (less than 0.1%), which by itself cannot explain the observed RT hysteresis loops. Thus, in order to produce long-range ferromagnetic order in these samples, the FM coupling has to be mediated via defects. The observed FM in this study may be attributed to the presence of oxygen vacancies, which mediate the ferromagnetic exchange between the coupled Mn ions. This is consistent with the bound magnetic polarons (BMP) model where defects like oxygen vacancies cause the polarons to overlap and give rise to a long-range ferromagnetic order in dilute magnetic semiconductors (DMS).