Magnetic Properties and XAFS Analysis of PEG-coated Gd-doped ZnO Magnetic Nanoparticles

In recent years, spintronics has attracted much attention due to the charge and spin properties of electrons. Zinc oxide (ZnO) is known as a wide bandgap semiconductor with high exciton binding energy. In our study, we have prepared diluted magnetic semiconductors by doping into ZnO nanoparticles with 3d transition metals. In this study, we aimed to prepare diluted magnetic semiconductors with higher magnetic properties by doping ZnO nanoparticles with Gd, which has seven unpaired electrons among 4f rare earth metals. The local structures of the samples were analyzed by X-ray absorption fine structure (XAFS) measurements, and the changes in saturation magnetization and atomic coordination depending on the doping amount of Gd were discussed.