Susceptibility Measurements and Magnetic Ordering of Hexagonal FeGe

Abstract

The spin structure of the metallic hexagonal B 35 phase of FeGe has been studied by means of susceptibility and magnetization measurements. Below the Neel temperature TN = 411 K hexagonal FeGe is a uniaxial antiferromagnet with the spins parallel to the c-axis. In each c-plane all spins are ferromagnetically coupled with an exchange constant J0 ≈ 22 meV. The antiferromagnetic exchange constant between nearest neighbour and next nearest neighbour c-planes are J1 = -3.5 meV and J2 = -0.9 meV resp. in the molecular field model. Susceptibility and spin flop experiments indicate that the spins tilt away from the c-axis below 30 K. We suggest that the spins then form a double cone structure with a cone halfangle of 20° at 4.2 K. In the double cone the c-plane components have a turn angle in the vicinity of 180° between nearest neighbour planes, which implies absence of long range order. The result is in good agreement with Fermi surface calculations by Sundström (Physica Scripta, following paper), which show the existence of several spin density wave vectors between Q = 0.89 π/c and Q = 1.3 π/c calipering different parts of the Fermi surface in a direction parallel to the c-axis.