Amorphous CeSi alloys — New heavy fermion system

Abstract

Bulk amorphous Ce x Si 1- x alloys have been successfully produced by a high rate sputtering method. Remarkable enhancement in their electronic specific heat coefficient and Pauli paramagnetic susceptibility at low temperatures indicate amorphous Ce x Si 1- x alloys to be a heavy-fermion system. Their electrical resistivity is very large and reveals the Kondo type logarithmic temperature dependence, however, it displays no T 2 dependence at low temperatures. The formation of Kondo lattice and ferromagnetic ordering are suppressed by the random atom stacking in the amorphous CeSi alloys.