SYNTHESIS OF SOME RARE EARTH BORIDES

There are many ways of synthesis of rare earth borides. In this work, we synthesized lanthanide (La, Gd, Eu, Sm, Nd and Tb) borides via magnesiothermic reduction in open air. Stoichiometric amounts of M2O3, B2O3 and Mg were mixed, where M is a lanthanide metal. Mixture was heated to 700 °C, 800 °C and 900 °C by Mg metal to form the metal borides.. Reaction temperature and reaction time were regulated to obtain nano and micro crystals with monodispersed and irregular particle morphology. Optimal conditions for the formation of metal borides were detected. It was found that optimum reaction temperature and reaction time of NdB6 is 700 °C and 3 hour, for SmB6 700 °C and 1 hour, for GdB6 900 °C and 4 hour and for TbB4 900 °C and 2 hour, 700°C and 4 hours for EuB6 [1]. Produced structures were leached with concentrated HCl to get rid of impurities which may cause different chemical and physical features. . Crystal structure of metal borides were investigated by X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) spectroscopy in addition to Energy Dispersive x-ray spectroscopy (EDS). Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) was used to analyze the geometrical varions. It was detected that pure metal borides can be synthesized with irregular morphology in nano and micro sizes [2].