Room Temperature Magnetic Behavior of Sol-Gel Synthesized Mn Doped ZnO

Mn doped ZnO nano-crystallites were synthesized by state of the art sol-gel derived auto-combustion technique. As-burnt powder was investigated with different characterization techniques to explore the properties of Mn doped ZnO dilute magnetic semiconductor. X-ray diffraction measurements indicate that Mn doped ZnO retain wurtzite type hexagonal crystal structure like ZnO. Compositional and morphological studies were carried out by energy dispersive X-ray analysis and scanning electron microscopy, respectively. Tempera-ture dependent resistivity of the sample exhibited the semiconducting behavior of the DMS material. Room temperature magnetic properties determined by vibrating sample magne-tometer, revealed the presence of ferromagnetic and diamagnetic contributions in Mn doped ZnO.