Reentrant paramagnetism induced by drastic reduction of magnetic couplings at surfaces of superparamagnetic nanoparticles

Abstract

Superparamagnetism appears when the N\'eel-Brown relaxation time of magnetic nanoparticles is shorter than the measurement time. Recent experimental studies of different types of magnetic nanoparticles revealed the existence of another paramagnetic region below the standard blocking temperatures. Here we elucidate the microscopic origin of this reentrant paramagnetism using a phenomenological model, which exploits the effects of weaker magnetic coupling strengths at the surfaces of ultrasmall nanoparticles. Within this picture, we have calculated the total magnetization of various nanoparticle arrays upon both finite-field and zero-field cooling processes via detailed classical Monte Carlo simulations, and found that the appearance of the reentrant phenomena necessarily invokes a drastic reduction of the magnetic coupling strengths at the surfaces of the nanoparticles. Our predictions can be readily tested experimentally using a micro-SQUID, and is expected to be beneficial in further applications of superparamagnetic nanoparticles.