abstract
We have synthesized SmCr0.85Mn0.15O3 (SCMO) chromites through the ceramic route. The compound crystallized into a distorted orthorhombic structure with the Pnma space group, which was confirmed from the Rietveld refinement of x-ray powder diffraction patterns. Neel temperature, noticed at 168K from the temperature variation of magnetisation, smaller than that reported for SmCrO3, indicated the influence of Mn3+ substitution on decreasing the antiferromagnetic ordering. A phenomenon of magnetization reversal was observed in the SCMO compound. At low magnetic fields, i.e., 500 Oe, a single compensation temperature (defined as the temperature where magnetization became zero) around 106K was observed in the field cooled magnetization curve. However, with the application of higher magnetic fields, i.e., under an applied field of 1000 Oe, a second compensation temperature was noticed around 8K. With a further increase in the magnetic field, the magnetization remained positive in both field cooled and zero field cooled protocols. A normal magnetocaloric effect was observed through an indirect method of field dependence of magnetisation measured in the temperature range of 2-152 K. The magnetic entropy change (-Delta S) of similar to 11.36 J kg(-1) K-1 along with the relative cooling power (RCP) of similar to 175.89 J kg(-1) was obtained in the temperature range of 10-20K for an applied field of 90 kOe, and their values at 50 kOe applied field were, respectively, almost twenty and forty times larger in magnitude in comparison to those for the SmCrO3 compound. The relatively large values of Delta S and RCP make the studied compound a potential candidate for magnetic refrigeration applications at low temperatures. Published by AIP Publishing.
keywords
YCRO3; CAPACITY; GDCRO3; SMCRO3
subject category
Physics
authors
Kumar, S; Coondoo, I; Vasundhara, M; Patra, AK; Kholkin, AL; Panwar, N
our authors
acknowledgements
The authors (S.K. and N.P.) would like to thank the University Grant Commission, New Delhi, for providing the Rajiv Gandhi National Fellowship (RGNF) and UGC Start-up-grant, whereas I.C. acknowledges the financial support from FCT, Portugal, through SFRH/BPD/81032/2011. The authors would also like to thank the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research networking projects SURE-CSC0132 and INTELCOAT-CSC0114 for partially supporting this work. A.L.K. acknowledges the CICECO-Aveiro Institute of Materials (Ref. FCT UID/CTM/50011/2013) financed by national funds through the FCT/MEC and, when applicable, co-financed by FEDER under the PT2020 Partnership Agreement.