Effect of hydrostatic pressure on the static susceptibility of the spin-glass systems Ag:Mn,Au:Mn,Cu:Mn and Au:Fe

Previous studies of the magnetic susceptibility of a Ag-3 at.% Mn spin-glass under high pressure are extended to include the systems Au-3at.% Mn, Cu-3at.% Mn and Au-3at.% Fe. In all four alloys the spin-glass freezing temperatureT ₀ increases with pressure, yielding the volume dependences lnT ₀/ lnV=–3.6±0.4, –4.1±0.6, –2.1±0.4 and –1.64±0.25, respectively. These results give information about the nature of the interaction mechanisms responsible for the spin-glass freezing phenomena. The pressure dependence of the Curie temperature of ferromagnetic Au-20at.% Fe was also studied.Dedicated to B. Mühlschlegel on the occasion of his 60th birthday     

Resistivity of positive-J spin glasses: Study ofLaGd under hydrostatic pressure

Results of a new calculation of the resistivity in the noise model of spin glasses, based on the –J S interaction forpositive J, are compared with measurements of the resistivity in an fcc La-8at% Gd alloy under hydrostatic pressures up to 12 kbar, the first positive-J resistivity investigations under pressure. A positive value ofJ that decreases with increasing pressure, in accord with other experiments, leads to quantitative agreement between theory and experiment if one uses a large electronic density of states at the Fermi energy, in accord with specific heat measurements and electronic band structure calculations in fcc La. Impurity potential scattering is found to contribute significantly to the resistivity. Its size and pressure variation is determined.This work is supported in part by the Deutsche Forschungs-gemeinschaft.     

Collective contributions to E1, ΔK=1 matrix elements in odd-odd deformed nuclei

The half-life of the 184.3 keV state in¹⁶⁵Dy has been remeasured asT _1/2=1.0±0.1 ns in order to deduce a reliable value for the transition matrix element of the depopulatingE l,ΔK=1 transition. Experimental E1,ΔK=1 transition matrix elements in odd-odd deformed nuclei are found to be systematically larger than similar values in adjacent odd-A isotones. This effect is supposed to be associated with higher-order vibrational admixtures coupled via RPC andp— n interaction mixings.     

On the evolution of the mass asymmetry in damped heavy-ion collisions

TotaT kinetic energy vs. fragment mass distributions have been measured in the reactions of⁶⁴Zn projectiles with¹¹⁴Sn,^natAg and¹³⁹La nuclei at incidence energies of 20–50% above the Coulomb barrier. Conclusions are drawn on the possible influence of nuclear structure effects on the energy dissipation and the mass drift behaviour of the present collision systems.     

Superconductivity in the alkali metals

At ambient pressure there are 29 elemental superconductors in the periodic table, none of which is an alkali metal. The first alkali metal to become superconducting under high pressure is Cs followed years later by Li. Alkali metals are believed to be exemplary free-electron systems. The fact that an alkali metal becomes superconducting at all is surprising and is a result of the fact that under pressure it shows marked deviations from free-electron behaviour where, counterintuitively, bands narrow and gaps widen. For this reason the alkali metals are among the most interesting systems known to study in high-pressure experiments and superconductivity is one of their most fascinating properties.     

Homogeneity of a supersaturated solid solution

Extended x-ray absorption fine structures, small-angle x-ray scattering, and atomistic model calculations have been employed to probe the homogeneity of the fcc solution created in Ag-Cu, a classical system demonstrating the extension of solubility across the entire miscibility gap through rapid quenching. Our results reveal that in many cases the supersaturated solutions formed have decomposition features on the scale of 1 nm. Conventional diffraction methods are inadequate in determining the level of supersaturation or the uniformity of such solid solution alloys.