Ferromagnetism of nanostructured zinc oxide films

Abstract

The paper presents a review of the causes of the occurrence of ferromagnetic properties in zinc oxide. It is shown that ferromagnetism only occurs in polycrystals at a fairly high density of grain boundaries. The critical grain size is about 20 nm for pure ZnO and over 1000 nm for zinc oxide doped with manganese. The solubility of manganese and cobalt in zinc oxide increases considerably with diminishing grain size. Even at the critical grain size, the ferromagnetic properties depend significantly on the film texture and the structure of intercrystalline amorphous layers.