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

Abstract

In CeSc1-xTixGe, Ti-alloying reduces the record-high antiferromagnetic (AFM) ordering temperature found in CeScGe at TN=46K 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 4f and band states. This is a further hint pointing to the local character of magnetism in this alloy. Magnetic fields up to 16T have a minor effect on the electrical resistivity of stoichiometric CeScGe. On the other hand, for x=0.65, we find that fields above 4T suppress the hump in ρ(T). Furthermore, the 4.2K 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.