Anomalous magnetic, transport and thermal properties of Gd5Ge3

TL;DR

This study investigates Gd5Ge3's magnetic, thermal, and transport properties, revealing a dominant antiferromagnetic order with a coexisting ferromagnetic component due to magnetostructural effects, and identifies a martensitic-like scenario affecting its physical behavior.

Contribution

It uncovers the coexistence of ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic phases in Gd5Ge3 driven by magnetostructural distortions and kinetic arrest phenomena.

Findings

Gd5Ge3 is a strong antiferromagnet with a small ferromagnetic component.

Magnetostructural effects cause field-induced irreversibility in properties.

Martensitic-like scenario influences the material's physical responses.

Abstract

We have studied the magnetic, thermal and magnetotransport properties of polycrystalline Gd5Ge3. It is found that the compound is a strong antiferromagnet and does not undergo any strong metamagnetic transition even in a field of 90 kOe. However, a small but visible ferromagnetic component is found to coexist with the antiferromagnetic order at low temperatures, as revealed by the anomalies in magnetization, magnetoresistance and heat capacity data. Our data suggest that the ferromagnetic component is of magnetostructural in origin, as evidenced by the strong field induced irreversibility of the magnetoresistance and heat capacity isotherms. The first order like magnetostructural distortion established in this material is found to result in a martensitic like scenario wherein the kinetic arrest controls the field/temperature dependence of physical properties such as heat capacity and magnetoresistance.