Designing high-performance microwave absorption materials through co-doping strategy: Experimental and theoretical insights

•Co-doped MnO2 nanowires exhibit excellent electromagnetic absorption performance with the minimal reflection loss is −51.03 dB and effective absorbing bandwidth can reach 7.04 GHz.•The bonds length decreases and bonds energy increase caused by Co doping result in the enhancement of attenuation ability and the impedance matching.•Thinner nanowires supply more surface and interface and improve the multiple polarizations loss. The essence of designing ideal absorption materials is to control the electromagnetic parameters. In this work, doping strategy was adopted to regulate electromagnetic parameters. According to the experimental results and density functional theory calculations, the introduction of Co can make the charge redistribute, distortion increase, bonds length decrease, and bonds energy enhance, which can lead to the reducing of dielectric storage and raising of dielectric loss. Meanwhile, the superfine long nanowires of Co-doped MnO2 can bring abundant surface and interfaces, which improve the polarization relaxations. These changes result in the enhancement of attenuation and improvement of impedance matching feature at the same time. Therefore, the Co-doped MnO2 exhibits excellent microwave absorption performance, the minimal reflection loss is -51.03 dB and effective absorbing bandwidth can reach 7.04 GHz. This work offers an effective approach for the design of high-performance microwave absorption materials, which has been validated through experimental and theoretical evidence. [Display omitted]