Hydrothermal synthesis, morphology, magnetic properties and self-assembly of hierarchical α-Fe2O3 (hematite) mushroom-, cube- and sphere-like superstructures

Abstract We report on glycine-free and glycine-assisted hydrothermal synthesis of microsized superstructures composed of self-assembled hematite nanoparticles. An X-ray powder diffraction measurements of the samples confirm good crystallization of the hematite nanoparticles with hydrothermal reaction time-dependent crystallite sizes in a range from ∼15 nm (45 h) to ∼26 nm (90 h). The FTIR and Raman spectroscopy confirm hematite structure, whereas TEM measurements reveal nanoparticle sub-units (subparticles). The computational analyses of particle shape show that the addition of glycine surfactant in hydrothermal reaction leads to more spherical shape of hematite hierarchical structures and smaller sizes. We found strong coercivity increases (up to ∼3 times) in the samples synthesized in the presence of glycine. The coercivity values from HC = 1305 Oe (mushroom-like shape synthesized by glycine-free hydrothermal reaction) to HC = 3725 Oe (sphere-like shape synthesized by glycine-assisted hydrothermal reaction) were obtained at 300 K. These results and their comparison with other described in the literature (e.g. bulk, wires, urchin-like, rods, tubes, plates, star-like, dendrites, platelets, irregular, nanocolumns, spindles, disks hematites, etc.) reveal that the hematite superstructures possess good magnetic properties. We propose that the glycine, oriented subparticles, exchange and dipole-dipole interactions may play an important role in the development of magnetic properties.