Magnetic phase diagram of the austenitic Mn-rich Ni-Mn-(In,Sn) Heusler alloys

TL;DR

This study investigates the magnetic phase diagram of Mn-rich Ni-Mn-(In,Sn) Heusler alloys using computational and experimental methods to understand and tune their magnetic states for technological applications.

Contribution

It combines Density Functional Theory simulations with $^{55}$Mn NMR to analyze magnetic order, comparing GGA and SCAN functionals, and validates findings with experimental data.

Findings

Discrimination between two magnetic scenarios via experiments.

Comparison of GGA and SCAN functionals in describing magnetic states.

Identification of ground state magnetic order in the alloys.

Abstract

Heusler compounds have been intensively studied owing to the important technological advancements that they provide in the field of shape memory, thermomagnetic energy conversion and spintronics. Many of their intriguing properties are ultimately governed by their magnetic states and understanding and possibly tuning them is evidently of utmost importance. In this work we examine the \alloys alloys with Density Functional Theory simulations and $^{55}$Mn Nuclear Magnetic Resonance and combine these two methods to carefully describe their ground state magnetic order. In addition, we compare the results obtained with the conventional generalized gradient approximation with the ones of strongly constrained and appropriately normed (SCAN) semilocal functionals for exchange and correlation. Experimental results eventually allow to discriminate between two different scenarios identified by ab initio simulations.