Abstract
Followed by our previous study on bismuth and chrome added Mn2Sb films formed by vacuum evaporation, we have investigated magnetic and magneto-optical properties of tin substituted Mn2Sb (Mn2Sb1-xSnx) films, where x was changed from 0 to about 0.40 (Sn 13.2 at%). The reason why tin was chosen as the third element is that there are two magnetic intermetallic compounds having different types of crystallographic structure in this system, namely Mn2Sb has tetragonal structure, while Mn2Sn has hexagonal structure. As the amount of tin substitution increases, the diffraction lines from Mn2Sb become weak and the saturation magnetization decreases but perpendicular magnetization films can be obtatined up to x=0.40 (Sn 13.2 at%). Results show that the shrink of the c-axis of Mn2Sb crystal occurs in the vicinity of x=0.15 (Sn 5 at%), where the decrease in coercivity and the increase in polar Kerr rotation are observed. These are considered to be closely correlated phenomena, reflecting presumably, the change in electronic structure of Mn2Sb.
