Room temperature ferroic orders in Zr and (Zr, Ni) doped SrTiO3

We synthesized strontium titanate SrTiO3 (STO), Zr doped Sr1−xZrxTiO3 and (Zr, Ni) co-doped Sr1−xZrxTi1−yNiyO3 samples using solid state reaction technique to report their structural, electrical and magnetic properties. The cubic Pm-3m phase of the synthesized samples has been confirmed using Rietveld analysis of the powder X-ray diffraction pattern. The grain size of the synthesized materials was reduced significantly due to Zr doping as well as (Zr, Ni) co-doping in STO. The chemical species of the samples were identified using energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX). The Zr and Ni dopants' homogeneity were confirmed from EDX mapping to negate spurious ferroic order due to dopant segregation. We observed forbidden first order Raman scattering at 148, 547 and 797 cm−1 which may indicate nominal loss of inversion symmetry in cubic STO. The absence of absorption at 500 cm−1 and within 600–700 cm−1 band in Fourier Transform Infrared spectra corroborates Zr and Ni as substitutional dopants in our samples. Due to 4% Zr doping in Sr0.96Zr0.04TiO3 sample dielectric constant, remnant electric polarization, remnant magnetization and coercivity were increased. Notably, in the case of 4% Zr and 10% Ni co-doping we have observed clearly the existence of both FE and FM hysteresis loops in Sr0.96Zr0.04Ti0.90Ni0.10O3 sample. In this co-doped sample, the remnant magnetization and coercivity were increased by ∼1 and ∼2 orders of magnitude respectively as compared to those of undoped STO. The coexistence of FE and FM orders in (Zr, Ni) co-doped STO might have the potential for interesting multiferroic applications.