A comparative study of Sr-doped LaMnO3 synthesised via solid-state reaction and sol–gel methods

This work deals with the synthesis of hole-doped La1-xSrxMnO3 (x = 0.25 and 0.33) perovskite via two different ways, namely a solid-state reaction method and a sol–gel process. Various properties of the samples have been investigated and compared by means of different techniques, namely X-ray diffraction (XRD), temperature-dependent resistivity measurements in the temperature range 25–300 K using a closed cycle refrigerator and vibrating sample magnetometry (VSM). All samples have orthorhombic crystal symmetry and an irregular variation in unit-cell volume with increase in Sr content. The average crystallite size was determined from the XRD data and found to lie in the range 19–22 nm. Metal–insulator transitions (MIT) were observed in all the samples via low-temperature electrical characterisations. The magnetic measurements confirm that the magnetisation does not saturate for the 25% Sr doped samples up to the available field of 10 kOe. The magnetic response also supports the interpretation of XRD and resistivity data. The obtained results are explained on the basis of double-exchange and super-exchange mechanisms.