Unusual magnetic properties of YbxGdl-xNi5 (x≤0.5) intermetallics

Abstract

In the presented paper we are focused on the magnetic properties of the hexagonal YbxGd1-xNi5 intermetallic compounds. Based on wide-ranging SQUID magnetometer (Quantum Design MPMS, temperature from 1.9K to 400K and magnetic field up to 7T) series of different magnetic measurements were carried out. It was shown that saturation magnetization and the Curie temperature strongly depends of Yb concentration. Moreover, the so-called field cooling - zero field cooling (FC-ZFC) curves reveal an unexpected existence of negative magnetization M in a certain temperature range. The possible origin of the diamagnetic behaviour, observed in doped samples, has been rather ascribed to the interaction between more than one opposite aligned magnetic sublattices. © 2010 IOP Publishing Ltd.