Crystalline and amorphous rare-earth transition metal alloys

Abstract

A large body of experimental data is available on the magnetic properties of crystalline and amorphous rare-earth transition metal compounds or alloys. These include the results of measurements of magnetization, nuclear magnetic resonance and Mössbauer effect and also results of measurements of magnetovolume effects. Some of the experimental data point to strongly localized 3d moments; others, however, point to itinerant 3d electron magnetism. In this paper we show that the 3d electron interaction between nearest neighbour atoms has a dominating influence on the magnetic properties of the crystalline compounds and amorphous alloys. Implications of this on the 3d electron bandwidth and the exchange interaction between the 3d electrons are discussed.