Structural, Physical, Magnetic, and Dielectric Study of Glassy and Crystalline Bismuth Zinc Silicates

Abstract

The current study aims to thoroughly analyze the optical, magnetic, and dielectric properties of the glass and glass-ceramics in the system Bi2O3.ZnO.SiO2 with stoichiometric composition xBi12SiO20.(100-x)Zn2SiO4(x = 0, 10, 30, 50, 70, 90, and 100). The systematic dependence on density, Bi2O3, and the presence of interphases was studied. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra of the glass-ceramic samples certify the changes occurring in structure from amorphous to crystalline form where more intense, sharp, narrow bands were observed. Both 10B and 30B samples display more ultraviolet (UV) absorbance than the remaining samples. Upon introducing Bi2O3, the glass sample's color gradually changed from brown to pale yellow. In the vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) study, the highest (9.22 × 10-7 emu/g) and lowest (4.53 × 10-7 emu/g) magnetic susceptibility were noticed for 30B and 70B samples, respectively. Further, all glass ceramics display diamagnetic properties due to the existence of Bi ions. The glass-ceramic samples showed better dielectric properties than glass samples due to changes from the amorphous nature of the glassy phase (high dielectric loss) to the well-ordered structure of the corresponding glass-ceramic (low dielectric loss). The glass ceramic sample of 100B attained much lower dielectric loss values (0.002, f = 106 Hz) than the corresponding glass sample (0.01, f = 106Hz) which could be helpful for electric storage devices, i.e. capacitors, supercapacitors, batteries, etc. Besides, the high-quality factor (Q = 2758) of the same glass-ceramic sample makes it promising in Radio Frequency (RF) circuits or other high- frequency applications.