EXOTIC PHASE TRANSITIONS IN RERhSn COMPOUNDS

Kazimierz £¹tka1, Roman Kmieæ2, Robert Kruk2, Andrzej W. Pacyna2, Micha³ Rams1, Tobias Schmidt3, Rainer Pöttgen3

1Marian Smoluchowski Institute of Physics, Jagiellonian University, 4 Reymonta Str., 30-059 Kraków, Poland,
2The Henryk Niewodniczañski Institute of Nuclear Physics, 152 Radzikowskiego Str., 31-342 Kraków, Poland,
3Institut für Anorganische und Analytische Chemie, Universität Münster, 8 Wilhelm-Klemm-Str., 48149 Münster, Germany

Crystal and magnetic properties of three equiatomic ternary RERhSn compounds (where RE=Ce, Nd, Gd) have been studied by means of X-ray diffraction, ac, and dc magnetic susceptibility measurements, as well as using Mössbauer Spectroscopy with 119Sn and 155Gd resonances. CeRhSn does not order magnetically down to 2 K while NdRhSn undergoes ferromagnetic transition at TC = 10.3 K and GdRhSn orders antiferromagnetically below TN = 16 K. Our CeRhSn and NdRhSn samples become superconductive below 6.5 K and 6.9 K, respectively.