Mixed Dopant Compiund Series

Physical and chemical properties:

Yttrium iron garnet (YIG) is a synthetic garnet with chemical composition Y3Fe2(FeO4)3, or Y3Fe5O12. It is a ferrimagnetic material with a Curie temperature of 560 K. YIG may also be known as yttrium iron garnet, or yttrium iron oxide or yttrium iron oxide, the latter two names usually associated with the powder form.

In YIG, five iron (III) ions occupy two octahedral and three tetrahedral sites, and the yttrium (III) ions are coordinated with eight oxygen ions in irregular cubes. The iron ions in the two coordination sites exhibit different spins, leading to magnetic behavior. For example, by replacing specific positions with rare earth elements, interesting magnetic properties can be obtained.

Application:

YIG has a high Verdet constant leading to the Faraday effect, a high Q-factor at microwave frequencies, low absorption at infrared wavelengths down to 1200 nm, and a very small linewidth for electron spin resonance. These properties make them useful for MOI (magneto-optical imaging) applications in superconductors.

YIG is used in microwave, acoustic, optical and magneto-optical applications, such as microwave YIG filters, or acoustic transmitters and transducers. It is transparent to light with wavelengths above 600 nm (the infrared end of the spectrum). It can also be used in solid-state lasers in Faraday rotators, data storage and various nonlinear optics applications.