Magnetic and structural properties of Nd2Fe17−xMx (M=Cu,Cr,V,Nb, and Zr) compounds

Abstract We report the structural and magnetic properties of Nd 2 Fe 17− x M x ( M =Cu, Cr, V, Nb and Zr), where x =0, 0.5, 1, 1.5, 2, 2.5, 3, and 4. X-ray diffraction shows that these compounds form the rhombohedral Th 2 Zn 17 structure with a small amount of α-Fe for some of the samples with small x values. For some of these compounds the rhombohedral structure cannot be formed at large values of x . X-ray diffraction on magnetically aligned samples show that these samples have in-plane anisotropy. The unit cell volume is found to increase with x for M =V, Nb, and Zr and decrease with x for M =Cu and Cr. The saturation magnetization decreases with x for all M atoms both at 25 and 300 K with the decrease ranging from 5 to 15% for x =1. The Curie temperature increases with x for small values of x with the increase ranging from 10 to 20% for x =1.