Facile one-step solvothermal synthesis of iron oxide/polypyrrole nanocomposites and their magnetic properties

Iron oxide/polypyrrole (PPy) nanocomposites (NCs) were prepared by a facile one-step solvothermal process using FeCl3 x 6H2O and pyrrole as starting materials. The resultant products were characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and superconducting quantum interference device magnetometer (SQUID). TEM image suggested the mesoporosity of the iron oxide/polypyrrole nanocomposites and pyrrole is found to play an important role in controlling the final morphology and porosity of the products. Magnetic hysteresis measurement reveals that nanocomposite shows a superparamagnetic behavior, and possesses a larger saturation magnetization strength (M(s)) of about 15.06 emu/g at room temperature, which allows its application in adsorption or separation as magnetically recyclable materials.