Investigation of structural, optical and electrical properties of Barium (Ba2+)- and Strontium (Sr2+)-doped Bi0.9La0.1FeO3 ceramics

In this work, we discuss the synthesis, characterization and dielectric properties of Bi0.9La0.1-x(Ba/Sr)(x)FeO3 [x = 0,0.05] ceramic compounds. These samples were synthesized via a solid-state reaction method and then characterized for structural analysis exploiting the X-ray diffraction (XRD) technique. The Rietveld refinement data inferred that all the prepared samples were acquired a monoclinic phase with space group C1c1. Field emission scanning electron micrographs (FE-SEM) images of the samples indicated highly grown grains with a moderate level of grain boundary development across the sample. The energy dispersive analysis of the X-ray (EDAX) diffraction spectra analysis confirmed that the composition was free from foreign impurities. Further, UV-Vis experiment was conducted and estimated average value of optical bandgap was about 2.2 eV, which is highly recommended for photocatalytic and opto-electronic device applications. Room-temperature dielectric studies revealed that samples were extremely good dielectric materials with low dielectric loss, which is important for storage device applications. In addition, the depressed semicircles obtained from impedance analysis indicated that the samples exhibited distributed relaxation times and non-Debye behavior.