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The strong dependence of the field-induced on the body-centered tetragonal ThCr2Si2-type and the critical behaviour of magnetic phase transition in NdMn2-xCuxSi2based compounds guide us to study the substitution Mn (atomic radius = 1.35 Å) by Cu (atomic radius = 1.28 Å) in layered NdMn1.4Cu0.6Si2compound. Room temperature x-ray diffraction study indicates clearly that most of the reflections can be identified with ThCr2Si2-type structure with space group I4/mmm. It found lattice parameters a slightly increases and lattice parameter c decrease compare to NdMn2Si2as indicated the decreasing of volume structure. The Neel temperature TNis found at 340 K while Curie temperature TCfound at 75 K respectively. The increasing concentration of Cu in replacement of Mn changes the magnetic phase transition from first order type for NdMn2Si2to second order type for layered NdMn1.4Cu0.6Si2compound as been determined by particular the S-shaped nature of the Arrott plot near TC. Our results indicate that the magnetic-field-induced magnetic phase transition plays a critical role on producing large magnetocaloric effect in these systems especially on second order type as the key for further investigation. The critical behaviour analysis in the vicinity of TCdemonstrates that the magnetism of the layered NdMn1.4Cu0.6Si2compound is governed by long range interactions.

The structural and magnetic properties of DyFe11.2Nb0.8 compound have been investigated by high intensity, high resolution synchrotron x-ray diffraction, ac magnetic susceptibility, and dc magnetization measurements as well as Mössbauer spectroscopy (5-300 K). The easy magnetization direction at room temperature is along the c-axis. With decreasing temperature, the magnetocrystalline anisotropy changes from easy-axis to easy-cone at Tsr2 (∼202 K), then to easy plane at Tsr1 (∼94 K). The thermal expansion coefficient obtained from the synchrotron x-ray study exhibits clear anomalies around both of the spin reorientation transition temperatures. The 57Fe hyperfine interaction parameters and magnetic moments values have been determined for the 8i, 8j, and 8f sites from the Mössbauer spectra.

The structural and magnetic properties of seven CeMn2Ge2-xSix compounds with x = 0.0-2.0 have been investigated in detail. Substitution of Ge with Si leads to a monotonic decrease of both a and c along with concomitant contraction of the unit cell volume and significant modifications of the magnetic states - a crossover from ferromagnetism at room temperature for Ge-rich compounds to antiferromagnetism for Si-rich compounds. The magnetic phase diagram has been constructed over the full range of CeMn2Ge2-xSix compositions and co-existence of ferromagnetism and antiferromagnetism has been observed in CeMn2Ge1.2Si0.8, CeMn2Ge1.0Si1.0 and CeMn2Ge0.8Si1.2 with novel insight provided by high resolution neutron and X-ray synchrotron radiation studies. CeMn2Ge2-xSix compounds (x = 0, 0.4 and 0.8) exhibit moderate isothermal magnetic entropy accompanied with a second-order phase transition around room temperature. Analysis of critical behaviour in the vicinity of TCinter for CeMn2Ge2 compound indicates behaviour consistent with three-dimensional Heisenberg model predictions.

MnNiGa2 crystallizes in the L21 (Heusler) structure and has a ferromagnetic ordering temperature TC ∼ 192 K. Rietveld refinement of the neutron diffraction patterns indicates that the Ga atoms occupy the equivalent 8c position, while Mn and Ni share the 4a (0, 0, 0) and 4b (0.5, 0.5, 0.5) sites with a mixed occupancy of Mn and Ni atoms. It is found that that ∼83% of Mn and ∼17% Ni are located at the 4a site while ∼83% of Ni and ∼17% Mn occupy the 4b site. There is no evidence of a magneto-volume effect around TC. In agreement with this finding, our detailed critical exponent analyses of isothermal magnetization curves and the related Arrott plots confirm that the magnetic phase transition at TC is second order.

All TbNi2, TbMn2, and TbNi2Mn compounds exhibit the cubic Laves phase with AB2-type structure in spite of the fact that the ratio of the Tb to transition-metal components in TbNi2Mn is 1:3. Rietveld refinement indicates that in TbNi2Mn the Mn atoms are distributed on both the A (8a) and B (16d) sites. The values of the lattice constants were measured to be a = 14.348 Å (space group F-43 m), 7.618 Å, and 7.158 Å (space group Fd-3 m) for TbNi2, TbMn2, and TbNi2Mn, respectively. The magnetic transition temperatures TC were found to be TC = 38 K and TC = 148 K for TbNi2 and TbNi2Mn, respectively, while two magnetic phase transitions are detected for TbMn2 at T1 = 20 K and T2 = 49 K. Clear magnetic history effects in a low magnetic field are observed in TbMn2 and TbNi2Mn. The magnetic entropy changes have been obtained.

A series of Li2Fe1-3x/2VxP 2O7 (x = 0, 0.025, 0.05, 0.075, and 0.1) cathode materials for LIBs were prepared by the sol-gel method. Structural characterization of Li2Fe1-3x/2VxP2O7 (x = 0, 0.025, 0.05, 0.075, and 0.1) samples was conducted by synchrotron X-ray diffraction. The morphology and oxidation states of Fe2+ and V 3+ in the Li2Fe1-3x/2VxP 2O7 samples were confirmed by scanning electron microscopy and magnetic susceptibility measurements, respectively. The electrochemical measurements indicated that Li2Fe1-3x/2VxP 2O7 (x = 0.025) delivered the higher reversible capacity of 79.9 mAh g-1 at 1 C in the voltage range of 2.0 - 4.5 V with higher 77.9% capacity retention after 300 cycles than those of Li 2FeP2O7 (48.9 mAh g-1 and 72.6%). Moreover, the rate capability of Li2Fe1-3x/2V xP2O7 (x = 0.025) were also significantly enhanced through vanadium substitution to iron of Li2Fe 1-3x/2VxP2O7. The vanadium substituted to Fe2 site of Li2FeP2O7 decreases Li occupying the Li5 position in the FeO5 unit, leading to a low degree exchange between Li and Fe in the MO5 (M = Li and Fe). The low degree cation disorder was beneficial to lithium-ion extraction/insertion during the charge-discharge process and hence enhances the capacity and rate capability.

Bulk magnetization measurements (5-320 K; 0-8T) reveal that below room temperature Mn0.9Ti0.1CoGe exhibits two magnetic phase transitions at ~178 K and ~280 K. Neutron diffraction measurements (3-350K) confirm that the transition at ~178K is due to the structural change from the low-temperature orthorhombic TiNiSi-type structure to the higher temperature hexagonal Ni2In-type structure while the transition at ~280K originates from the transition from feromagnetism to paramagnetism.

The structure and magnetic properties of the La0.7Pr 0.3Fe11.4-xCuxSi1.6 compounds have been investigated by X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy and magnetisation measurements. Cu substitution for Fe in La0.7Pr 0.3Fe11.4-xCuxSi1.6 (x = 0, 0.06, 0.12, 0.23, 0.34) leads to a reduction in hysteresis loss, a decrease in magnetic entropy change but an increase in Curie temperature (TC). The influences of annealing processes at different temperatures on T C, magnetic hysteresis, and the magnetocaloric effect (MCE) of La0.7Pr0.3Fe11.4Si1.6 are investigated in detail. It has been found that a short-time and high temperature annealing process has benefits for the formation of the NaZn13 types as phase compared to a long-time and low temperature annealing process.

Pr0.8Y0.2Mn2 Ge 2 is found to exhibit four magnetic transitions on decreasing the temperature from the paramagnetic region: (i) paramagnetism to intralayer antiferromagnetism (AFl) at TN intra; (ii) AFl to canted ferromagnetism (Fmc) at TC inter; (iii) Fmc to conical magnetic ordering of the Mn sublattice (Fmi) at Tcc; and (iv) Fmi(Mn) to Fmi(Mn) + F(Pr) at TC Pr. These changes in magnetic structure are discussed in terms of changes in the Mn-Mn separation distances caused by the unit cell contraction and by electronic effects due to replacement of 20% of Pr with Y.

The structural and magnetic properties of the intermetallic compounds NdMn2−xTixSi2(x = 0, 0.1, 0.2, and 0.3) have been studied by x-ray and high resolution neutron powder diffraction, specific heat, dc magnetization, and differential scanning calorimetry measurements over the temperature range 3–450 K. The Curie temperature and Néel temperature of NdMn2Si2 decrease from TC = 36 K and TN = 380 K to TC = 14 K and TN = 360 K, respectively, on substitution of Ti (x = 0.3) for Mn. The magnetocaloric effect at the first order ferromagnetic phase transition at TC, has been investigated in detail. Under a change of magnetic field of 0–5 T, the maximum value of the magnetic entropy change is 27 J kg−1 K−1 at x = 0, reducing to 15.3 J kg−1 K−1 at x = 0.1 and 10 J kg−1 K−1 at x = 0.3; importantly, no thermal or field hysteresis losses occur (eliminated from 0.3 K and 28.5 J kg−1 at x = 0 around TC) with increase in Ti concentration. Combined with the lack of any hysteresis effects, these findings indicate that NdMn1.9Ti0.1Si2 compound offers potential as a candidate for magnetic refrigerator applications in the temperature region below 35 K.