Abstract
This study highlight the effect of the replacement of a transition-metal oxide Fe
2
O
3
with a transition-metal halide FeCl
3
on the structural and electrical properties of the iron–sodium borate devitrified glass. The preparation process was performed based on the fast quenching principle. The XRD patterns showed that the FeCl
3
-free and FeCl
3
/Fe
2
O
3
samples are devitrified glasses, while the Fe
2
O
3
-free sample is a pure glass. The ESR spectral analysis showed an increase in Fe
3+
at the expense of Fe
2+
, while the TEM and SEM images showed some crystallites suspended and distributed randomly within the amorphous glass network matrices of all samples except for that of the Fe
2
O
3
-free sample. The FTIR analysis showed an increase in BO
4
:BO
3
ratio, as well as the presence of the structural groups (FeO
4
and FeO
6
), where the concentration of FeO
6
increased at the expense of FeO
4
. The
V
–
I
characteristics for the studied samples are similar to those of the P–N junction, in which the forward voltage shifted to a lower value when Fe
2
O
3
was replaced with FeCl
3
. The electric measurements showed a decrease in the DC conductivity values, while that of time-dependence of temperature varying, at a constant electric power, showed that the self-heating of the studied samples decreased when Fe
2
O
3
was replaced with FeCl
3
.