Magnetic percolation in diluted magnetic semiconductors

We demonstrate that the magnetic properties of diluted magnetic semiconductors are dominated by short ranged interatomic exchange interactions that have a strong directional dependence. By combining first principles calculations of interatomic exchange interactions with a classical Heisenberg model and Monte Carlo simulations, we reproduce the observed critical temperatures of a broad range of diluted magnetic semiconductors. We also show that agreement between theory and experiment is obtained only when the magnetic atoms are randomly positioned. This suggests that the ordering of diluted magnetic semiconductors is heavily influenced by magnetic percolation, and that the measured critical temperatures should be very sensitive to details in the sample preparation, in agreement with observations.     

Magnetic hardening in Cu-Mn-Al alloys

The magnetic and structural properties of Cu₄₂Mn₂₅Al₃₃ and Cu₄₄Mn₂₅Al₃₁ alloys have been examined in as-cast and heat-treated samples. Magnetic hardening was achieved by heat treating the as-cast samples at 300°C, where they developed two finely dispersed phases identified as the ferromagnetic Heusler phase and the nonmagnetic γCu-Al phase. A maximum coercive field of 8 kOe was obtained in a heat-treated Cu₄₄Mn₂₅Al₃₁ sample. Single domain particle behavior is suggested to explained the observed magnetic hysteresis.     

Magnetic moments in heusler alloys

The Heusler alloys are a series of local moment ferromagnets of composition X₂MnY, with a magnetization of ～4mu_B per Mn atom. Magnetic measurements on the alloy series Ni₂Mn_xT_1?xSn, where T is Ti, V or Cr, indicate that the T site moment changes from ?mu_B (for Ti), through zero (for V), to ⁺mu_B (for CR). A simple physical interpretation is proposed for this sign change in the present work. This approach facilities the interpretation of several other features observed in Heusler alloys.     

Large negative magnetic contribution to the thermal expansion in iron-platinum alloys: quantitative theory of the Invar effect

We show that the large negative magnetic contribution to the thermal expansion in disordered Fe-Pt alloys can be understood within the disordered local moment (DLM) approach. On the basis of first principles calculations we quantitatively describe the spontaneous volume magnetostriction for various Pt concentrations. It is found that the Invar effect in these alloys is entirely related to the state of thermal magnetic disorder modeled by the DLM states. We also show that the experimentally observed anomaly in the temperature dependence of the magnetization is due to a spontaneous reduction of the local magnetic moments rather than to "hidden excitations."     

Magnetic behaviour ofCuAuFe alloys

The magnetic properties of Cu_99-xAu_xFe₁ alloys (x=12, 37 and 50.7 ats) have been investigated over the temperature range 4.2–70 K using low field AC magnetic susceptibility measurements and mössbauer spectroscopy. All alloys exhibit spin glass behaviour at low temperature with freezing temperatures T_f-5.7–7.6 K. Results of analysis of the high temperature (T3 T_f) Curie-Weiss behaviour are compared with those obtained from analysis of the broadly distributed 4.2 K Mössbauer spectra.     

Magnetic clusters in amorphous metal alloys

The effect of thermal treatment in combination with an external magnetic field and/or elastic stress on the magnetic characteristics of amorphous metal alloys of the 2NSR type is studied. The complex behavior of the magnetization and coercivity values in dependence on the length of annealing at temperatures below crystallization is described. It is assumed that the observed changes in the macroscopic magnetic characteristics are associated with the formation of clusters with different degrees of exchange interaction.     

Magnetic domain observations in Fe-Ga alloys

The domain structure of Fe-Ga bulk alloys is investigated with magnetic force (MFM) and magneto-optic Kerr microscopy. Published domain observations on this class of materials predominantly reveal maze-like domain patterns that indicate out-of-plane magnetization, i.e. out-of-plane anisotropy. Contrary to the belief that this anisotropy is due to the presence of nanoscale heterogeneities [1] and [2] (Bai et al., 2005, 2009), we show that it is due to a damaged surface layer caused by standard mechanical polishing. The surface conditions in Fe-Ga alloys are more sensitive to stress-induced damage than in pure α-Fe. This is explained as being due to increased magnetostriction. We demonstrate that the damaged surface layer can be removed with an additional polishing step using colloidal amorphous silica. On (0 0 1) bulk crystal surfaces, the domain structures, obtained after the removal of the damaged surface layer, reveal in-plane magnetization with sharp and straight 90° and 180° domain walls that are expected in these alloys.     

Magnetic properties of CuRh alloys

By means of rapid quenching techniques single phased samples of Cu_xRh_1?x(0?x?1) were obtained. For these alloys the Knight shift of ⁶³Cu and ¹⁰³Rh has been determined employing pulsed NMR at low temperatures, furthermore the magnetic susceptibility was measured for temperatures between 4.2 and 300 K. While the Knight shift of ¹⁰³Rh is dominated by s-electron contributions in spite of a high density of d-states at the Fermi level, for the susceptibility, however, the d-electron contributions prevail. In addition the susceptibility shows a pronounced maximum at about 10 at.% Cu. Using the extrapolated Knight shift of copper (x→0) we estimate a net copper hyperfine field of — 15 T in close agreement with the corresponding values for CuPd and CuPt.     

Magnetic properties of Cr-Fe-Mn alloys

The magnetic behaviour of a Cr_80−xFe₂₀Mn_x alloy system with x=2, 7, 10, 13 and 22 has been investigated in the temperature range 2-400 K through measurements of magnetization, electrical resistivity, magnetoresistivity, specific heat and thermal expansion. The temperature vs. Mn concentration magnetic phase diagram of the system is rich in magnetic behaviour with ferromagnetic (FM), antiferromagnetic (AFM) and paramagnetic phase regions and a spin-glass (SG) region at the lowest temperatures. Phase transition temperatures amongst these different magnetic phases could be identified from well-defined anomalies of magnetic origin that are displayed by graphs of the above-mentioned physical properties as a function of temperature. The time relaxation of the thermoremanent, isothermal remanent and field-cooled magnetizations below and above the SG freezing temperature show unusual aspects. These relaxations do not follow the usual superposition principle that is expected for typical SG materials. Negative giant magetoresistance (GMR) is observed in the alloys at 4 K. The GMR initially increases sharply on increasing the Mn content in the alloy system, followed by a tendency towards a saturation negative value for concentrations of more than about 10 at% Mn. Low-temperature plots of C_p/T vs. T², where C_p is the specific heat, present anomalous behaviour for alloys with x=2, 10 and 22. For x=2 the plot shows an upturn at the lowest temperatures that changes over to a prominent downturn for x=10 and 22. This behaviour is attributed to Fe concentration fluctuations in the alloys, confirming the theoretical model of Matthews.     

Magnetic properties of amorphous alloys

The magnetic properties of existing amorphous iron based materials, i.e., Fe--metalloid, Fe--early transition metals and Fe--rare earth alloys, are briefly discussed for some representative alloys. The spin orientation of amorphous Fe--metalloid alloys has been determined by the angular dependence of hyperfine interactions. It is shown that in iron--early transition metals ferromagnetic order is not long-ranged, but determined by magnetic clusters. The magnetic hyperfine field distributions of Fe-rich iron--early transition metals consist of a high and a low field tail. The magnetic structure has been investigated for two representative Fe--RE (RE = Er, Ce) amorphous alloys. For the first time, the magnetic coupling phenomenon in amorphous/crystalline multilayers has been discussed. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Magnetic ordering in YbEu alloys

Magnetization measurements of alloys of 10–40 at.% Eu in Yb have revealed a broad isofield magnetic moment peak at 8 K for the forty atomic percent alloy. The peak moves to lower temperatures with decreasing Eu content. At low Eu concentrations evidence for ferromagnetic ordering is seen in the magnetization data.     

Magnetic breakdown in very dilute aluminum-silver alloys

The temperature and magnetic field dependences of the electrical magnetoresistance of very dilute (1 300 ? RRR ? 10 000) AlAg alloys have been measured for H ? [110]. Although no oscillations were observed, there is evidence in the temperature dependence of the magnetoresistance for the existence of magnetic breakdown.     

Magnetic relaxations in amorphous soft magnetic alloys

The paper reviews selected results of the extended experimental investigations of magnetic properties, time–temperature stability and workability of the soft magnetic amorphous alloys controlled by structural magnetic relaxation. Complex approach to the magnetic relaxations in multicomponent amorphous alloys is presented. The transition from magnetic after-effect to a new MAE spectrometry is illustrated on ternary amorphous CoSiB alloy.     

Magnetic annealing in electrodeposited Co-P amorphous alloys

The different diffusion processes that occur in electrodeposited Co-P amorphous alloys when they are subjected to magnetic annealing at different temperatures are studied by Coercive field measurements. Different processes are identified with different activation energies: 0.19 eV (stress relaxation): 0.75 eV (directional order); 2.9 eV (crystallization process). The low value of the activation energy for the first mechanism is identified with the diffusion of H, and that of the second with the diffusion of P.     

Magnetic hysteresis in rapidly quenched rare-earth alloys

The magnetic and structural properties of rapidly quenched (Pr₈₀Ga₂₀)_100-xFe_x, RTbFe and RTbFe(Co)M alloys are examined over a wide range of chemical compositions, where R ≡ Pr, Sm, MM and M ≡ B and Si. The Ga-containing samples show relatively high coercive fields (up to 3 kOe) in the amorphous state which subsequently disappear after crystallization. On the other hand, the high coercive fields (≈5 kOe) of melt-spun RTbFe samples decrease slightly after crystallization but their magnetic moment increases substantially. Melt-spun RTbFe(Co)M samples are generally magnetically soft in the as-quenched state. Magnetic hardening is produced by annealing the samples around 750°C leading to coercive fields which could not be measured with an ordinary electromagnet (H_c #62; 23 kOe). The best properties have been obtained on a Pr₁₄Fe₇₁B₁₅ sample with a coercive field of 8 kOe and an energy product of 8.5 MGOe. Thermomagnetic data show that a structural transformation takes place upon heating the samples to 750°C. The Curie temperature of the precipitate phase is around 320°C while that of the as-quenched phase is around 160°C. Transmission electron microscope studies show a very fine precipitate structure with a precipitate size below 100 Å. The precipitate phase is believed to be highly anisotropic leading to the observed hard magnetic properties.     

The Curie temperature of dilute ferromagnetic alloys near the percolation threshold

Upper limit for the Curie temperature T_c(x) of the dilute Heisenberg ferromagnet near percolation threshold is derived. Qualitative arguments are put forward that this limit gives a correct dependence of T_c on the concentration of magnetic atoms x.     

Magnetic properties of electrodeposited iron-nickel alloys

The basic magnetic properties, viz., magnetic saturation and coercive force, have been established by measurement of about 150 specimens for electrodeposited iron-nickel alloys over the entire range of chemical compositions. The magnetization data were related ot the physicochemical aspects of the electrodeposition process.