Investigations of chemical pressure effects on the valence behaviour of praseodymium intermetallics I: The Pr1−xYxSn3family

The pseudo-binary Pr1−xYxSn3system was investigated to detect possible valence instabilities of praseodymium induced by chemical pressure. Differential thermal analysis, metallographic and X-ray determinations showed that the solid solubility of yttrium in the cubic PrSn3lattice occurs in a narrow homogeneity range of yttrium concentration (0–0.3 atoms per formula unit). Magnetic susceptibility measurements were performed in the temperature range 1.5–300 K for the existing phases. Evidence of chemical pressure effects is shown, but antiferromagnetic order persists in all the phases examined. Deviations from the molecular field approximation are observed.