We report on the existence of acoustic emission during the paramagnetic-monoclinic to ferromagnetic-orthorhombic magnetostructural phase transition in the giant magnetocaloric Gd5Si2Ge2 compound. The transition kinetics have been analyzed from the detected acoustic signals. It is shown that this transition proceeds by avalanches between metastable states.
Lightly doped III-V semiconductor InAs is a dilute metal, which can be pushed beyond its extreme quantum limit upon the application of a modest magnetic field. In this regime, a Mott-Anderson metal-insulator transition, triggered by the magnetic field, leads to a depletion of carrier concentration by more than one order of magnitude. Here, we show that this transition is accompanied by a two-hundred-fold enhancement of the Seebeck coefficient which becomes as large as 11.3mV.K$^{-1}approx 130frac{k_B}{e}$ at T=8K and B=29T. We find that the magnitude of this signal depends on sample dimensions and conclude that it is caused by phonon drag, resulting from a large difference between the scattering time of phonons (which are almost ballistic) and electrons (which are almost localized in the insulating state). Our results reveal a path to distinguish between possible sources of large thermoelectric response in other low density systems pushed beyond the quantum limit.
We have performed pressure dependent X-ray diffraction and resonant X-ray emission spectroscopy experiments on USb$_2$ to further characterize the AFM-FM transition occurring near 8 GPa. We have found the magnetic transition coincides with a tetragonal to orthorhombic transition resulting in a 17% volume collapse as well as a transient $textit{f}$-occupation enhancement. Compared to UAs$_2$ and UAsS, USb$_2$ shows a reduced bulk modulus and transition pressure and an increased volume collapse at the structural transition. Except for an enhancement across the transition region, the $textit{f}$-occupancy decreases steadily from 1.96 to 1.75.
Physical nature of giant magnetocaloric and electrocaloric effects, MCE and ECE, is explained in terms of the new fundamentals of phase transitions, ferromagnetism and ferroelectricity. It is the latent heat of structural (nucleation-and-growth) phase transitions from a normal crystal state to the orientation-disordered crystal (ODC) state where the constituent particles are engaged in thermal rotation. The ferromagnetism or ferroelectricity of the material provides the capability to trigger the structural phase transition by application, accordingly, of magnetic or electric field.
The isostructural alloying of two compounds with extremely different magnetic and thermo-structural properties has resulted in a new system, (MnNiSi)1-x(FeCoGe)x, that exhibits extraordinary magnetocaloric properties with an acute sensitivity to applied hydrostatic pressure (P). Application of hydrostatic pressure shifts the first-order phase transition to lower temperature ($Delta$ T=-41 K with P=3.43 kbar) but preserves the giant value of isothermal entropy change (-$Delta$S$max$=143.7 J/kg K for a field change of {Delta}B=5 T at atmospheric pressure). Together with the magnetic field, this pressure-induced temperature shift can be used to significantly increase the effective relative cooling power.
It is known that the Zircon-type orthovanadates RVO4 show promise in many different applications as catalysts and optical materials. In this work, we demonstrate that the TbVO4 compound can be also used as magnetic refrigerant in efficient and ecofriendly cryocoolers due to its strong magnetocaloric effect at low temperature regime. The application of a relatively low magnetic field of 2 T along the easy magnetization axis (a) gives rise to a maximum entropy change of about 20 J/kg K at 4 K. More interestingly, under sufficiently high magnetic fields, the isothermal entropy change -{Delta}ST remains approximately constant over a wide temperature range which is highly appreciated from a practical point of view. In the magnetic field change of 7 T, -{Delta}ST that reaches roughly 22 J/kg K remains practically unchanged between 0 and 34 K leading to an outstanding refrigerant capacity of about 823 J/kg. On the other hand, the lowering of crystallographic symmetry from the tetragonal to the orthorhombic structure occurring close to 33 K as confirmed by Raman scattering data results in a strong magnetic anisotropy. Accordingly, strong thermal effects can be also obtained simply by spinning the TbVO4 single crystals between their hard and easy orientations in constant magnetic fields instead the standard magnetization-demagnetization process. Such rotating magnetocaloric effects would open the way for the implementation of TbVO4 in a new generation of compact and simplified magnetic refrigerators that can be dedicated to the liquefaction of hydrogen and helium.