Effect of metal dopant on structural and magnetic properties of ZnO nanoparticles

Zn1-xRxO (R = Li, Mg, Cr, Mn, Fe and Cd) were obtained by using co-precipitation synthesis technique with constant weight percent of 3% from R ions. The phase composition, crystal structure, morphology, density functional theory (DFT), and magnetic properties were examined to comprehend the influence of Zn2+ partial substitution with R ions. X-ray diffraction shows that the ZnO lattice parameters were slightly affected by R doping and the doped sample crystallinity is enhanced. Our results show that introducing Cr, Mn and Fe along with Mg into ZnO induces a clear magnetic moment without any apparent distortion in the structural morphology. The spatial configuration of dopant atoms is determined from first-principles calculations, giving a better understanding of the position of the dopant atom responsible for the magnetism. The magnetic moments obtained from our calculations are 3.67, 5.0, and 4.33 μB per dopant atom for Cr, Mn, and Fe, respectively, which agree with the experimental values. While Cr and Fe tend to form clusters, Mn has more propensity to remain evenly distributed within the system, avoiding cluster-derived magnetism.