Investigations on the structural, multiferroic, and magnetoelectric properties of Ba1-xCexTiO3 particles

The present study reports the synthesis of Ba1-xCexTiO3 (x = 0, 1, 2, 3, and 4 mol. %) particles by the sol-gel method and investigates the ferroelectric and magnetoelectric coupling properties. Rietveld refinement of XRD analysis identifies the structural transformation from tetragonal to pseudocubic above 2 mol. % of Ce concentration supported by Raman spectra. The unitcell volume V has increased due to the substitution of Ce3+ and Ce4+ ions on both Ba and Ti sites. XPS data reveal that the oxygen vacancies are rich for Ce doped BaTiO3 compared to the undoped particles. From the FESEM analysis, a gradual increase in the average grain size from 618 to 1046 nm is found up to 3 mol. % and then decreases for 4 mol. % (537 nm). The PE loop determines the highest Pr value of 9.95 μC/cm2 at 2 mol. % of Ce due to the existence of the morphotropic phase boundary (tetragonal + pseudocubic phases). MH curves show that the net magnetization enhances from 6.63 to 7.9 × 10−4 emu/g on Ce doping. Further, the dynamic m...