744 research outputs found
The Effect of Transfer Printing on Pentacene Thin-Film Crystal Structure
The thermal deposition and transfer Printing method had been used to produce
pentacene thin-films on SiO2/Si and plastic substrates (PMMA and PVP),
respectively. X-ray diffraction patterns of pentacene thin films showed
reflections associated with highly ordered polycrystalline films and a
coexistence of two polymorph phases classified by their d-spacing, d(001): 14.4
and 15.4 A.The dependence of the c-axis correlation length and the phase
fraction on the film thickness and printing temperature were measured. A
transition from the 15.4 A phase towards 14.4 A phase was also observed with
increasing film thickness. An increase in the c-axis correlation length of
approximately 12% ~16% was observed for Pn films transfer printed onto a PMMA
coated PET substrate at 100~120 C as compared to as-grown Pn films on SiO2/Si
substrates. The transfer printing method is shown to be an attractive for the
fabrication of pentacene thin-film transistors on flexible substrates partly
because of the resulting improvement in the quality of the pentacene film.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
The interparticle interaction and crossover in critical lines on field-temperature plane in PrSrMnO nanoparticles
The magnetic properties and the effects of interparticle interaction on it
have been studied in nanoparticles of half doped PrSrMnO.
Three samples consisting of nanoparticles of different average particle sizes
are synthesized to render the variation in interparticle interaction. Though
all the samples crystallize in the same structure to that of their bulk
compound, the low temperature ferromagnetic-antiferromagnetic transition, which
is present in bulk compound, is not evident in the nanoparticles. Linear as
well as nonlinear ac susceptibility coupled with dc magnetic measurements have
shown the superparamagnetic behavior of these nanoparticles where the blocking
temperature increases with the increasing particle size. Presence of
interparticle interaction is confirmed from the temperature variation of
coercive field and the analysis of frequency dependent ac susceptibility. We
have identified the nature of this interaction to be of dipolar type, and show
that its strength decreases with the increasing particle size. The effect of
this dipolar interaction on magnetic properties is intriguing as the compounds
exhibit crossover from de Almeida-Thouless to Gabay-Toulouse like critical
lines on field-temperature plane above their respective interaction field. In
agreement with theoretical prediction, we infer that this crossover is induced
by the unidirectional anisotropy arising from interparticle interaction, and
this is confirmed from the presence of exchange bias phenomenon.Comment: To appear in Phys. Rev.
Spin Disorder and Magnetic Anisotropy in Fe3O4 Nanoparticles
We have studied the magnetic behavior of dextran-coated magnetite
(FeO) nanoparticles with median particle size \left=8 .
Magnetization curves and in-field M\"ossbauer spectroscopy measurements showed
that the magnetic moment of the particles was much smaller than the bulk
material. However, we found no evidence of magnetic irreversibility or
non-saturating behavior at high fields, usually associated to spin canting. The
values of magnetic anisotropy from different techniques indicate that
surface or shape contributions are negligible. It is proposed that these
particles have bulk-like ferrimagnetic structure with ordered A and B
sublattices, but nearly compensated magnetic moments. The dependence of the
blocking temperature with frequency and applied fields, ,
suggests that the observed non-monotonic behavior is governed by the strength
of interparticle interactions.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures, 3 Table
Validity of the N\'{e}el-Arrhenius model for highly anisotropic Co_xFe_{3-x}O_4 nanoparticles
We report a systematic study on the structural and magnetic properties of
Co_{x}Fe_{3-x}O_{4} magnetic nanoparticles with sizes between to nm,
prepared by thermal decomposition of Fe(acac)_{3} and Co(acac)_{2}. The large
magneto-crystalline anisotropy of the synthesized particles resulted in high
blocking temperatures ( K \leqq K for d nm ) and large coercive fields ( kA/m for K).
The smallest particles ( nm) revealed the existence of a magnetically
hard, spin-disordered surface. The thermal dependence of static and dynamic
magnetic properties of the whole series of samples could be explained within
the N\'{e}el-Arrhenius relaxation framework without the need of ad-hoc
corrections, by including the thermal dependence of the magnetocrystalline
anisotropy constant through the empirical Br\"{u}khatov-Kirensky
relation. This approach provided values very similar to the bulk
material from either static or dynamic magnetic measurements, as well as
realistic values for the response times ( s).
Deviations from the bulk anisotropy values found for the smallest particles
could be qualitatively explained based on Zener\'{}s relation between
and M(T)
Electronic structure and chemical bonding of nc-TiC/a-C nanocomposites
The electronic structure of nanocrystalline (nc-) TiC/amorphous C
nanocomposites has been investigated by soft x-ray absorption and emission
spectroscopy. The measured spectra at the Ti 2p and C 1s thresholds of the
nanocomposites are compared to those of Ti metal and amorphous C. The
corresponding intensities of the electronic states for the valence and
conduction bands in the nanocomposites are shown to strongly depend on the TiC
carbide grain size. An increased charge-transfer between the Ti 3d-eg states
and the C 2p states has been identified as the grain size decreases, causing an
increased ionicity of the TiC nanocrystallites. It is suggested that the
charge-transfer occurs at the interface between the nanocrystalline TiC and the
amorphous C matrix and represents an interface bonding which may be essential
for the understanding of the properties of nc-TiC/amorphous C and similar
nanocomposites.Comment: 13 pages, 6 figures, 1 table;
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevB.80.23510
Spinel ferrite nanocrystals embedded inside ZnO: magnetic, electronic and magneto-transport properties
In this paper we show that spinel ferrite nanocrystals (NiFe2O4, and CoFe2O4)
can be texturally embedded inside a ZnO matrix by ion implantation and
post-annealing. The two kinds of ferrites show different magnetic properties,
e.g. coercivity and magnetization. Anomalous Hall effect and positive
magnetoresistance have been observed. Our study suggests a
ferrimagnet/semiconductor hybrid system for potential applications in
magneto-electronics. This hybrid system can be tuned by selecting different
transition metal ions (from Mn to Zn) to obtain various magnetic and electronic
properties.Comment: 12 pages, 14 figs. accepted for publication at PR
A novel wear-resistant magnetic thin film material based on a nanocomposite alloy
In this study we report on the film growth and characterization of thin
(approximately 50 nm thick) Ti-Fe-C films deposited on amorphous quartz. The
experimental studies have been complemented by first principles density
functional theory (DFT) calculations. Upon annealing of as-prepared films, the
composition of the metastable Ti-Fe-C film changes. An iron-rich phase is first
formed close to the film surface, but with increasing annealing time this phase
is gradually displaced toward the film-substrate interface where its position
stabilizes. Both the magnetic ordering temperature and the saturation
magnetization changes significantly upon annealing. The DFT calculations show
that the critical temperature and the magnetic moment both increase with
increasing Fe and C-vacancy concentration. The formation of the metastable
iron-rich Ti-Fe-C compound is reflected in the strong increase of the magnetic
ordering temperature. Eventually, after enough annealing time (
minutes), nano-crystalline -Fe starts to precipitate and the amount and
size of these precipitates can be controlled by the annealing procedure; after
20 minutes of annealing, the experimental results indicate a nano-crystalline
iron-film embedded in a wear resistant TiC compound. This conclusion is further
supported by transmission electron microscopy studies on epitaxial Ti-Fe-C
films deposited on single crystalline MgO substrates where, upon annealing, an
iron film embedded in TiC is formed. Our results suggest that annealing of
metastable Ti-Fe-C films can be used as an efficient way of creating a
wear-resistant magnetic thin film material.Comment: 23 pages, 13 figure
Phase separation and the effect of quenched disorder in
The nature of phase separation in has been probed by
linear as well as nonlinear magnetic susceptibilities and resistivity
measurements across the 2nd order paramagnetic to ferromagnetic transition
() and 1st order ferromagnetic to antiferromagnetic transition (). We
found that the ferromagnetic (metallic) clusters, which form with the onset of
long-range order in the system at , continuously decrease their size with
the decrease in temperature and coexist with non-ferromagnetic (insulating)
clusters. These non-ferromagnetic clusters are identified to be
antiferromagnetic. Significantly, it is shown that they do not arise because of
the superheating effect of the lower temperature 1st order transition. Thus
reveals unique phase coexistence in a manganite around half-doping encompassing
two long-range order transitions. Both the ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic
clusters form at and persist much below . Substitution of quenched
disorder (Ga) at Mn-site promotes antiferromagnetism at the cost of
ferromagnetism without adding any magnetic interaction or introducing any
significant lattice distortion. Moreover, increase in disorder decreases the
ferromagnetic cluster size and with 7.5% Ga substitution clusters size reduces
to the single domain limit. Yet, all the samples show significant short-range
ferromagnetic interaction much above . Resistivity measurements also
reveal the novel phase coexistence identified from the magnetic measurements.
It is significant that, increase in disorder up to 7.5% increases the
resistivity of the low temperature antiferromagnetic phase by about four
orders
Magnetization Reversal and Nanoscopic Magnetic Phase Separation in Doped La1-xSrxCoO3
The doped perovskite cobaltite La1-xSrxCoO3 (LSCO) has been advanced as a
model system for studying intrinsic magnetic phase separation. We have employed
a first-order reversal curve (FORC) method to probe the amount of irreversible
switching in bulk polycrystalline LSCO as a function of Sr doping, field
cooling procedure, and temperature. The value of the FORC distribution, rho, is
used as a measure of the extent of irreversible switching. For x < 0.18, the
small values of rho and its ridge-like distribution along local coercivity (Hc)
and zero bias (Hb), are characteristic of non-interacting single domain
particles. This is consistent with the formation of an array of isolated
nanoscopic ferromagnetic clusters, as observed in previous work. For x >= 0.18,
the much larger values of rho, the tilting of its distribution towards negative
bias field, and the emergence of regions with negative rho, are consistent with
increased long-range ferromagnetic ordering. The FORC distributions display
little dependence on the cooling procedure. With increasing temperature, the
fraction of irreversible switching determined from the FORC distribution
follows closely the ferromagnetic phase fraction measured by La nuclear
magnetic resonance. Our results furthermore demonstrate that the FORC method is
a valuable first-pass characterization tool for magnetic phase separation.Comment: 30 pages, 8 figures, to appear in PR
H_c_3 for a thin-film superconductor with a ferromagnetic dot
We investigate the effect of a ferromagnetic dot on a thin-film
superconductor. We use a real-space method to solve the linearized
Ginzburg-Landau equation in order to find the upper critical field, H_c_3. We
show that H_c_3 is crucially dependent on dot composition and geometry, and may
be significantly greater than H_c_2. H_c_3 is maximally enhanced when (1) the
dot saturation magnetization is large, (2) the ratio of dot thickness to dot
diameter is of order one, and (3) the dot thickness is large
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