“THE MORIN TRANSITION IN NANOSTRUCTURED PSEUDOCUBIC HEMATITE: EFFECT OF THE INTERCRYSTALLITE MAGNETIC EXCHANGE”

J.F. BENGOA; A.M. ALVAREZ; A.E. BIANCHI; G. PUNTE; R.E. VANDENBERGHE; R.C.MERCADER; S.G. MARCHETTI

MATERIALS CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS

ELSEVIER SCIENCE SA

Año: 2010 vol. 123 p. 191 - 198

0254-0584

The Morin transition in -Fe2O3 particles with homogeneous pseudocubic morphology of about 1.8mside has been studied by different techniques. The particles are made up of nanometric crystallites with anarrow size distribution. Samples annealed at 673, 773 and 873 K, yielded Morin transition temperatures,TM, of about 230, 241, and 245 K, respectively, which are lower than the bulk value, TM ≈263 K. In addition,the temperature range TM through which these samples undergo the transition is very narrow withrespect to the values reported in the literature. Ranges of 20, 10 and 8K, were obtained for the samplesannealed at 673, 773 and 873 K. In this work, through the estimation of the exchange magnetic energy, wedemonstrate that the existence of the Morin transition, and its shift and breadth are related to the presenceof intercrystallite interactions within the pseudocubic particles. These intercrystallite interactions aremodified by the annealing treatments, which help to remove non-stoichiometric hydroxyl groups andincorporated water molecules.