A Review of NMR Studies in RCo3 Systems Presenting d-Moment Instability

Abstract

For the past few years, intermetallic systems with the formula RCo3, where R is a rare earth, have attracted the attention of the magnetism community. In these systems, the magnetism associated to the Co ions presents a magnetic instability which gives rise to metamagnetic phase transitions observed as a change on the Co magnetic moment for some critical values of the molecular field acting on this sublattice. A number of publications about these systems is concerned with basic magnetic measurements and 59Co NMR in compounds such as Y1−x R x Co3, where R = Gd, Nd, Er. The Co ions are distributed among three crystal sites with different symmetries, one of these sites being further split into two magnetic sites, a fact in itself that considerably complicates the NMR spectra. Besides, as we have observed, the linewidths and even the number of lines appearing on the NMR spectra are strongly dependent on some NMR features, such as the radiofrequency power applied to the sample. Adding to this fact, these magnetic peculiarities depend on the compounds stoichiometry; therefore it is no surprise to find conflicting results in the literature. In the present paper a review of the NMR published data will be made, including some new results of our own.