Thermal and magnetic anomalous crystal field effects in Ce-heavy fermion compounds

Abstract

Specific heat anomalies due to the Γ7 → Γ8 thermal promotion were measured for CePd3B0.6 and CePd3Si0.3. For the heavy-fermion compound CePd3B0.6 one observes a quasi-linear C(T) dependence, instead of the expected exponential one. Moreover, the cubic crystal field splitting in the J = 5/2 ground state alone does not explain the thermal dependence of the susceptibility. These results are discussed in terms of the different hybridization of the conduction electron states with the ground (Γ7) and excited (Γ8) crystal field levels.