A study of the structural phase transformation and superconductivity in HfV2
journal contribution
posted on 2006-05-11, 13:41authored byMark J. Parsons, P Brown, J. Crangle, Klaus-Ulrich Neumann, B. Ouladdiaf, T.J. Smith, Nadhum K. Zayer, K.R.A. Ziebeck
Specific heat and magnetization measurements on the hard superconductor HfV2
confirm the presence of a structural phase transformation at 117 K and a superconducting
transition temperature of 9 K. Above 117 K the compound has the cubic Laves phase C15
structure. High-resolution neutron powder diffraction measurements reveal that below 117 K
there is a mixed phase structure consisting predominantly of an orthorhombic component
together with a cubic untransformed part. Both of these phases superconduct and their critical
temperatures are similar, if not identical. In the normal state the magnetic properties are
consistent with those expected for a Pauli paramagnet in which the Fermi level lies just below a
high peak in the density of states. These conclusions are supported by band-structure calculations
carried out using the linear muffin-tin orbital (LMTO) approximation.
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Citation
PARSONS et al, 1998. A study of the structural phase transformation and superconductivity in HfV2. Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter, 10(38), pp. 8523-8534