Dual-phase formation in LaFeO₃ upon doping of rare-earth Dy³⁺: Struct–Opto–Dielectric–Magnetic characteristics

The potential technological uses of perovskite-based LaFeO₃ nanostructured materials have gotten a lot of interest in recent years. In this present investigation, we have attempted to investigate the substitution of unpaired 4f electrons of the Dy³⁺ ions into LaFeO₃ material would play a crucial role in the various functional properties, thereby enhancing their suitability for various applications. The motivation of this work is to synthesize, rare-earth Dy³⁺-doped lanthanum ferrite with the composition of La_1−xDy_xFeO₃ (x = 0 to 0.25) using the conventional solid-state reaction method. The effect of Dy³⁺ substitution in lanthanum ferrite on the physical properties was evaluated using X-ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, Raman analysis, scanning electron microscopy, Elemental/mapping analysis, UV–Vis spectroscopy, photoluminescence spectroscopy, dielectric and magnetic measurement techniques. The novelty of this work: the synthesized ferrite materials shows both orthorhombic structured Pbnm phase of LaFeO₃ and cubic (I 21 3) Dy₂O₃ phase were observed from Rietveld refinement of XRD analysis. While increasing the Dy substitution, the Dy₂O₃ phase starts to increase from 1.44 to 15.05%, respectively. The optical behavior was greatly affected and reduced the optical band gap, E_g values from 3.68 to 3.17 with the effect of Dy. The dielectric properties of synthesized ferrite materials realized a dielectric constant dispersion that displayed a maximum at low frequency. The synthesized La_1−xDy_xFeO₃ ferrite materials displayed canted antiferromagnetic and paramagnetic behavior. The values of saturation magnetization (M_s) were enhanced from 0.108 (x = 0) to 1.383 (x = 0.25) emu/g. It is suggested that synthesized La_1−xDy_xFeO₃ ferrite materials with different optical, dielectric, and magnetic properties could be tailored for different requirements.