Effects of sintering temperature on structural, infrared, magnetic and electrical properties of Cd0.5Zn0.5FeCrO4 ferrites prepared by sol–gel route

In this work, an attempt is made to study the effects of sintering temperature on the structural, infrared, magnetic and electrical properties of Cd_0.5Zn_0.5FeCrO₄ ferrites. Samples were prepared by sol–gel route and sintered at 900 and 1100 °C. The structural characterization of the synthesized powders by X-ray powder diffraction showed that only single phase with cubic spinel structure existed. Estimated values of unit cell parameter and average grains size show an increase with sintering temperature. The intensities of absorption bands, spontaneous magnetization, electrical conductivity, and dielectric constants were found to increase with increasing sintering temperature. The non-overlapping small polaron tunneling (NSPT) model dominates the conduction process for the studied samples which present a relaxation phenomenon with non-Debye nature. Close activation energies values were found from analyzes of relaxation time and dc-conductivity indicating that the relaxation and the conduction processes may be attributed to the same type of charge carriers. The equivalent electrical circuit (R_g+ R_gb//CPE_gb) was used for modeling the Nyquist data.