Glycine-assisted solution combustion synthesis of NiCo₂O₄ electromagnetic wave absorber with wide absorption bandwidth

Design of high-performance electromagnetic (EM) wave absorbing materials has been regarded as an effective solution to excessive EM wave interference problem. As a promising candidate, NiCo₂O₄ absorbers have attracted enormous research attentions. However, currently reported morphology-manipulation synthetic methods of NiCo₂O₄ absorbers are time-consuming and require high energy consumption, which inhibit their practical applications. Herein, a more facile and cost-effective solution combustion synthesis was utilized to fabricate NiCo₂O₄ materials. The absorber prepared by using glycine as fuel displayed the best EM wave absorption performance. Impressively, ultra wide absorption bandwidth of 7.44 GHz from 10.56 GHz to 18 GHz could be achieved with relatively thin thickness of 2.1 mm NiCo₂O₄ sample fabricated in this work displayed the widest effective absorption bandwidth (EAB) among reported NiCo₂O₄-based EM wave absorbing materials so far. In view of its simple and low-cost synthetic process and excellent EM wave dissipation capacity, NiCo₂O₄ samples in this work showed great feasibility as practical absorber. In addition, our findings may also provide new sight for facile preparation of other high-performance EM wave absorbers by solution combustion synthesis instead of complex morphology-manipulation routes.