The phase diagram of heavy fermions with Cerium and Europium ions

TL;DR

This paper explains the Doniach phase diagram of heavy fermions with Ce and Eu ions using the Anderson model, highlighting how pressure or doping influence the competition between Kondo and RKKY interactions and affect ground state properties.

Contribution

It provides a scaling solution of the Anderson model to describe the pressure and doping dependence of heavy fermion phase diagrams, aligning theoretical results with experimental observations.

Findings

The model captures the main features of the Doniach diagram for specific compounds.

Pressure affects the balance between Kondo and RKKY interactions.

Theoretical results match experimental phase diagrams of Ce and Eu-based heavy fermion systems.

Abstract

Doniach phase diagram of heavy fermions with Ce and Eu ions is explained by the scaling solution of the Anderson model. At high temperatures, where the rear earth ions behave as nearly independent local moments (LM) the system has a large paramagnetic entropy and its properties are defined by Kondo temperature, $T_K(p)$, where $p$ is the external parameter, like pressure or doping. For a given $T_K(p)$, the scaling law allows an estimate of the pressure or doping dependence of the coupling constant which is then used to find the dependence of the RKKY temperature $T_{RKKY}(p)$ and N\'eel temperature $T_N(p)$ on the control parameter. The competition between the on-site Kondo coupling and the off-site RKKY coupling determines the mechanism by which the system removes the paramagnetic entropy at low temperatures. The pressure-induced change of the ground state is explained by the differences in the functional form of $T_K(p)$ and $T_{RKKY}(p)$. Our theoretical results capture the main features shown by the Doniach diagram of CeRu$_2$Ge$_2$, CeCu$_2$(Ge$_{1-x}$Si$_{x})_2$ or EuCu$_2$(Ge$_{1-x}$Si$_{x})_2$.