The structural, electrical and magnetoelectric properties of soft-chemically-synthesized SmFeO3 ceramics

The structural, electrical and magnetoelectric properties of SmFeO3 ceramic samples, synthesized using a soft-chemical method, were studied. A structural analysis of the material was carried out by the Rietveld refinement of room temperature x-ray diffraction data. The temperature dependence of the dielectric peaks was analyzed by fitting them with two Gaussian peaks corresponding to two phase transitions—one being electric, and the other being magnetic in nature. The depression angle of the semicircles in a Nyquist plot representing the grain and grain boundary contributions in the sample was estimated. The grain boundary effect, appearing at temperatures above 75 °C, is explained using the Maxwell–Wagner mechanism. The impedance study reveals a semi-conducting grain with an insulating grain boundary, leading to the formation of surface and internal barrier layer capacitors and resulting in a very high dielectric constant. The effect of dc conductivity on the loss tangent at low frequencies and high temperature has been analyzed. The frequency dependence of ac conductivity in the two different regions can be explained on the basis of correlated barrier hopping and quantum mechanical tunneling models. The material is found to exhibit canted antiferromagnetism and improper ferroelectric characteristics. The value of the magnetoelectric voltage-coupling coefficient (α) of a SmFeO3 ceramic is found to be 2.2 mV cm−1 Oe−1.