High field magnetic behavior in Boron doped Fe2VAl Heusler Alloys

Abstract

We have investigated the magnetic behavior of Fe2VAl1−xBx (x=0, 0.03, 0.06 and 0.1) alloys under high temperature and high magnetic field conditions separately. Although, the low temperature DC magnetization data for the alloys above x>0 show clear magnetic transitions, the zero field cooled (ZFC) and field cooled (FC) curves indicate the presence of spin cluster like features. Further, critical exponent (γ) deduced from the initial susceptibility above the Tc, does not agree with standard models derived for 3 dimensional long range magnetic systems. The deviation in γ values are consistent with the short range magnetic nature of these alloys. We further extend the analysis of magnetic behavior by carrying the magnetization measurements at high temperatures and high magnetic fields distinctly. We mainly emphasize the following observations; (i) The magnetic hysteresis loops show sharp upturns at lower fields even at 900 K for all the alloys. (ii) High temperature inverse susceptibility do not overlap until T=900 K, indicating the persistent short range magnetic correlations even at high temperatures. (iii) The Arrott's plot of magnetization data shows spontaneous moment (MS) for the x=0 alloy at higher magnetic fields which is absent at lower fields (<50 kOe), while the Boron doped samples show feeble MS at lower fields. The origin of this short range correlation is due to presence of dilute magnetic heterogeneous phases which are not detected from the X-ray diffraction method.