The effect of Au and Ni doping on the heavy fermion state of the Kondo lattice antiferromagnet CePtZn

Abstract

We have probed the effect of doping CePtZn with Au and Ni and also investigated in detail the magnetic behavior of the iso-structural CeAuZn. A magnetic ground state is observed in both CePt0.9Au0.1Zn and CePt0.9Ni0.1Zn with TN = 2.1 and 1.1 K and the coefficient of the linear term of electronic heat capacity γ = 0.34 and 0.9 J/mol K2, respectively. The corresponding values for CePtZn are 1.7 K and 0.6 J/mol K2. The altered values of TN and γ show that the electronic correlations in CePtZn are affected by doping with Au and Ni. CeAuZn orders magnetically near 1.7 K and its electrical resistivity shows a normal metallic behavior. Together with a γ of 0.022 J/mol K2 the data indicate a weak 4f-conduction electron hybridization in CeAuZn characteristic of normal trivalent cerium based systems.