Sol-gel auto combustion synthesis and characterizations of cobalt ferrite nanoparticles: Different fuels approach

Abstract The spinel structured cobalt ferrite (CoFe 2 O 4 ) nanoparticles were successfully synthesized by sol-gel auto combustion method using three different fuels (Ethylene glycol, Glycine and Urea) approach. Pure phase formation of cobalt ferrite with cubic spinel structure was observed for all the samples in X-ray diffraction patterns. The average crystallite size, lattice parameter and other structural parameters were calculated from XRD data. The lower value of average particle size of 15 nm was noticed with urea as fuel. The sponge-like spherical shaped morphology was observed irrespective of the fuels. The average grain size was found to be in the range of 65–86 nm. The enhanced saturation magnetization, coercivity and other magnetic parameters obtained by M-H plots confirmed the superparamagnetic behaviour of the samples. It is observed from experimental results that using urea as a fuel one can obtain smaller particle size while the improved magnetic properties were observed for ethylene glycol as a fuel.