Enhanced Structural and Magnetic Coupling in a Mesocrystal-Assisted Nanocomposite

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• 作者：Yuanmin Zhu ; Qian Zhan ; Jan-Chi Yang ; Yugandhar Bitla ; Pingping Liu ; Chen-I Li ; Heng-Jui Liu ; V. Suresh Kumar ; Elke Arenholz ; Qing He ; Ying-Hao Chu
• 刊名：ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces
• 出版年：2016
• 出版时间：January 20, 2016
• 年：2016
• 卷：8
• 期：2
• 页码：1104-1111
• 全文大小：761K
• ISSN：1944-8252

文摘

Benefiting from the advances made in well-controlled materials synthesis techniques, nanocomposites have drawn considerable attention due to their enthralling physics and functionalities. In this work, we report a new heteroepitaxial mesocrystal–perovskite nanocomposite, (NiFe₂O₄)_0.33:(La_0.67Ca_0.33MnO₃)_0.67. Elaborate structural studies revealed that tiny NiFe₂O₄ nanocrystals aggregate into ordered octahedral mesocrystal arrays with {111} facets together with a concomitant structural phase transition of the La_0.67Ca_0.33MnO₃ matrix upon postannealing process. Combined magnetic and X-ray absorption spectroscopic measurements show significant enhancement in the magnetic properties at room temperature due to the structural evolution of magnetic NiFe₂O₄ and the consequent magnetic coupling at the heterointerfaces mediating via well connected octahedrons of Mn–O₆ in La_0.67Ca_0.33MnO₃ and (Ni,Fe)-O₆ in NiFe₂O₄. This work demonstrates an approach to manipulate the exciting physical properties of material systems by integrating desired functionalities of the constituents via synthesis of a self-assembled mesocrystal embedded nanocomposite system.