Structural, magnetic, and spectroscopic studies of YAgSn, TmAgSn, and LuAgSn

The rare earth-silver-stannides YAgSn, TmAgSn, and LuAgSn were synthesized from the elements by arc-melting and subsequent annealing. The three stannides were investigated by X-ray powder and single-crystal diffraction: NdPtSb type, P6₃mc, Z=2, a=468.3(1), pm, wR₂=0.0343, 353 F² values, 12 variables for YAgSn, and ZrNiAl type, P6¯2 m, a=726.4(2), , wR₂=0.0399, 659 F² values, 15 variables for TmAgSn, and a=723.8(2), , wR₂=0.0674, 364 F² values, 15 variables for LuAgSn. Besides conventional laboratory X-ray data with monochromatized Mo radiation, the structures were also refined on the basis of synchrotron data with , in order to clarify the silver-tin ordering more precisely. YAgSn has puckered, two-dimensional AgSn] networks with Ag-Sn distances of 278 pm, while the AgSn] networks of TmAgSn and LuAgSn are three-dimensional with Ag-Sn distances of 279 and 284 pm for LuAgSn. Susceptibility measurements indicate Pauli paramagnetism for YAgSn and LuAgSn. TmAgSn is a Curie-Weiss paramagnet with an experimental magnetic moment of 7.2 μ_B/Tm. No magnetic ordering is evident down to 2 K. The local environments of the tin sites in these compounds were characterized by ¹¹⁹Sn Mössbauer spectroscopy and solid-state NMR (in YAgSn and LuAgSn), confirming the tin site multiplicities proposed from the structure solutions and the absence of Sn/Ag site disordering. Mössbauer quadrupolar splittings were found in good agreement with calculated electric field gradients predicted quantum chemically by the WIEN2k code. Furthermore, an excellent correlation was found between experimental ¹¹⁹Sn nuclear magnetic shielding anisotropies (determined via MAS-NMR) and calculated electric field gradients. Electronic structure calculations predict metallic properties with strong Ag-Sn bonds and also significant Ag-Ag bonding in LuAgSn.