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Title: Critical behavior of a site-diluted three-dimensional Ising magnet

Journal Article · · Phys. Rev. B: Condens. Matter; (United States)

The critical behavior of the site-diluted three-dimensional Ising antiferromagnet Fe/sub 1-x/Zn/sub x/F/sub 2/ has been studied with the use of neutron scattering and linear birefringence techniques. The neutron scattering measurements were performed on a crystal with xapprox. =0.5 and T/sub N/ = 42.50 K. The critical scattering has a Lorentzian profile both above and below T/sub N/. The staggered susceptibility and correlation length exhibit power-law divergences over the reduced-temperature range 10/sup -1/ to 2 x 10/sup -3/ with critical exponents ..gamma.. = ..gamma..' = 1.44 +- 0.06 and ..nu.. = ..nu..' = 0.73 +- 0.03, respectively. From the linear birefringence ..delta..n, the critical behavior of the magnetic heat capacity was determined on a crystal with x = 0.4 and T/sub N/ = 47.05 K. d(..delta..n)/dT clearly exhibits cusplike behavior rather than a power-law divergence over the reduced-temperature range 2 x 10/sup -2/ to 10/sup -3/ with exponent ..cap alpha.. = ..cap alpha..' = -0.09 +- 0.03. The correlation-length and heat-capacity critical indices satisfy the hyperscaling relation 3..nu..+..cap alpha..-2 = 0 to within the experimental errors. Since all measured exponents differ markedly from the pure Ising values, this strongly suggests that random-exchange Ising behavior has been observed. The results are consistent with recent theoretical predictions for the random-exchange Ising fixed point by Newman and Riedel.

Research Organization:
Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, New York 11978
OSTI ID:
5970037
Journal Information:
Phys. Rev. B: Condens. Matter; (United States), Vol. 27:11
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English