Effect of sintering temperatures on the magnetoelectric properties of Bi0.78La0.08Sm0.14Fe0.85Ti0.15O3 ceramics

Multiferroic materials attracted much attention because of magnetoelectric (ME) coupling effect. Herein, a typical single-phase multiferroic BiFeO3 (BFO) was co-doped at A and B sites by solid-state method, and Bi0.78La0.08Sm0.14Fe0.85Ti0.15O3 (BLSFTO) ceramics were prepared at different sintering temperatures (940, 960, 980 and, 1000?C). The effects of sintering temperature on the microstructure, morphology, dielectric, ferroelectric and magnetic properties were systematically studied. The remanent polarization (Pr) and coercive field (Ec) of the BLSFTO ceramics show a non-linear change with sintering temperature. The remanent polarization reaches maximum (0.0560 ?C/cm2) in the sample sintered at 1000?C, whereas the maximum Ec of 1.32 kV/cm was obtained in the specimen sintered at 940?C. The remanent magnetization (Mr) increases with the increase of sintering temperature, while change of the saturation magnetization with sintering temperature is negligible. When BLSFTO specimen is sintered at 1000?C, Mr reaches the maximal value of 0.1344 emu/g.