Formation of Nickel Dendritic Crystals with Peculiar Orientations by Magnetic-Induced Aggregation and Limited Diffusion

Micrometer scaled nickel dendritic crystals with distinctive style were synthesized via a self-assembled solution route without any surfactant. Structure characterizations suggest that the dendritic crystal shows first preferential orientation along [111] which is the magnetic easy axis of cubic nickel crystal and subsequently along [100], which differs from the prevalent dendritic fractals synthesized in nonequilibrium system. A formation process is proposed to illustrate the growth of ferromagnetic nickel microleaves. Additionally, the magnetic properties of nickel microleaf have been observed, which demonstrates that the saturation magnetization (Ms) and the coercivity (Hc) are 48 emu/cm−3 and 77 Oe, respectively. The relatively high Ms and low Hc for as-prepared product could be attributed to its special structure.