2023/01/20 by Vivek Kumar, A. Bauer, Kumar, Vivek +15
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #Iron-based superconductors research #Magnetic Properties of Alloys #Rare-earth and actinide compounds #Strongly Correlated Electrons (cond-mat.str-el)
paper · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2301.08617
openalex publication_date 2023/01/20 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
We report the magnetization, ac susceptibility, and specific heat of optically float-zoned single crystals of CePdAl3. In comparison to the properties of polycrystalline CePdAl3 reported in the literature, which displays a tetragonal crystal structure and no long-range magnetic order, our single crystals exhibit an orthorhombic structure (Cmcm) and order antiferromagnetically below a Néel temperature T\rm N = 5.6 K. The specific heat at zero-field shows a clear λ-type anomaly with a broad shoulder at T\rm N. A conservative estimate of the Sommerfeld coefficient of the electronic specific heat, γ= 121~\mathrmmJ~K-2~mol-1, indicates a moderately enhanced heavy-fermion ground state. A twin microstructure evolves in the family of planes spanned by the basal plane lattice vectors a\rm o and c\rm o, with the magnetic hard axis b\rm o common to all twins. The antiferromagnetic state is characterized by a strong magnetic anisotropy and a spin-flop transition induced under magnetic field along the easy direction, resulting in a complex magnetic phase diagram. Taken together our results reveal a high sensitivity of the magnetic and electronic properties of CePdAl3 to its structural modifications.