Cooperative ordering of superparamagnetic ZnO nanograins

Abstract

In this paper we have tried to understand the precise nature of magnetism in ZnO nanoparticles. Cooling field dependence of magnetic hysteresis and coercive field was observed for high temperature annealed sample indicating cooperative magnetic correlation and ordering within the agglomerated nanograins. The increasing induced internal magnetic field along the direction of external field for the high temperature annealed sample has been fitted with the modified Weiss-Brillouin model indicating emergence of long range intergrain interaction among the superparamagnetic grains. We propose a simple idea that explains the reduction of magnetisation due to vortex state like flux closure situation.