Low temperature thermopower and magnetoresistance of Sc-rich CeSc1-xTixGe

Abstract

In CeSc 1-xTixGe, Ti-alloying reduces the record-high antiferromagnetic (AFM) ordering temperature found in CeScGe at T = 46 KN and induces ferromagnetism for x ≥ 0.5. In this work we focus on the AFM side, i.e. Sc-rich samples, and study their thermopower S T( ) and magnetoresistance ρ H T( , ). The measured S T( ) is small in comparison with the thermopower of other Ce-systems and shows some features that are compatible with a weak hybridization between the f4 and band states. This is a further hint pointing to the local character of magnetism in this alloy. Magnetic fields up to 16 T have a minor effect on the electrical resistivity of stoichiometric CeScGe. On the other hand, for x = 0.65, we find that fields above 4 T suppress the hump in ρ T( ). Furthermore, the 4.2 K magnetoresistance displays a strong decrease in the same field range, also in coincidence with magnetization results from the literature. Our results indicate that ρ T H( , ) is a proper tool to assess the H T− phase diagram of this system.