Synthesis of Spin-ladder Sr14Cu24O41 Material by Citrates Sol-gel Method

A new process to synthesize polycrystalline samples of Sr14Cu24O41 was presented. Firstly, dry gel powder of Sr14Cu24O41 was synthesized by the citrates sol-gel method, using Sr（NO3）2, Cu（NO3）2, ethylene glycol and citrate acid as raw materials. Then, polycrystalline samples of Sr14Cu24O41 were prepared by solid-state reaction. Thermal Gravimetric and Differential Thermal Analysis（TG-DTA） showed that the temperature for solid-state reaction is at 942 ℃. The samples are identified to be single phase by X-ray Diffraction（XRD） and Scanning Electron Microscopy（SEM）. The SEM pictures showed that the first-step particles were at even size of about 100 nm by this technique. The electronic transport measurements showed that the doping compound were semiconductor with a crossover temperature T in the Arrhenius plot of the resistivity versus temprature.