Structural, Morphological, Optical and Magnetic Property of Mn doped Ferromagnetic ZnO thin film

TL;DR

This study investigates how Mn doping affects the structural, optical, and magnetic properties of ZnO thin films, revealing defect-induced ferromagnetism at room temperature without secondary phases.

Contribution

It provides detailed analysis of Mn-doped ZnO thin films, demonstrating intrinsic ferromagnetism and the effects of doping on structural and optical properties without secondary phases.

Findings

No secondary phases detected in Mn-doped ZnO films

Room temperature defect-mediated ferromagnetism observed

Doping causes band gap red shift and increased defect states

Abstract

The structural, optical and magnetic properties of the Zn1-xMnxO (0 < x < 0.05) thin films synthesized by sol-gel technique have been analyzed in the light of modification of the electronic structure and disorder developed in the samples due to Mn doping. The films are of single phase in nature and no formation of any secondary phase has been detected from structural analysis. Absence of magnetic impurity phase in these films confirmed from morphological study also. Increasing tendency of lattice parameters and unit cell volume has been observed with increasing Mn doping concentration. The incorporation of Mn2+ ions introduces disorder in the system. That also leads to slight degradation in crystalline quality of the films with increasing doping. The grain size reduces with increase in Mn doping proportion. The band gaps shows red shift with doping and the width of localized states shows an increasing tendency with doping concentration. It is due to the formation of impurity band and trapping of Mn atoms, which leads to the generation of the defect states within the forbidden band. Photoluminescence (PL) spectra shows gradual decrease of intensity of exitonic and defect related peaks with increasing Mn doping. Defect mediated intrinsic ferromagnetism has been observed even at room temperaturenfor 5at% Mn doped ZnO film. The strong presence of antiferromagnetic (AFM) interaction reduces the observed ferromagnetic moments.