Investigation of magnetic behavior of a composite made of a soft and hard magnetic material

Composite of a soft and hard magnetic material with compositional formula (NiFe2O4)60 − (BaFe12O19)40 was synthesized by sol-gel method. Thus synthesized composite was characterized structurally using X-ray diffraction and morphological studies were done by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The XRD pattern obtained showed both the phases indicating the composite nature of material. Reitveld analysis of X-ray diffractogram confirmed hexagonal structure with P63mm space group for Barium hexaferrite (BFO) and cubic structure with Fd-3m:2 space group for Nickle ferrite (NFO). The SEM micrograph indicates grains of nano size about 100-300nm, while EDAX studies show that there are no other impurities than the expected elements in required proportions. To study the magnetic and electric properties of this material magnetization and impedance was measured with variation of magnetic field and frequency at room temperature. From the magnetization data we observed that the material is exhibiting magnetically single phase. Dielectric studies show a continuous decrease in dielectric constant with increasing frequency.