Preparation and magnetic characterization of ultrafine-grained ζ-Mn2N0.86 compound bulk

The ultrafine-grained ζ-Mn2N0.86 compound bulk was prepared by a novel method that combined the solid-gas reaction, ball milling and spark plasma sintering. Characterizations on the magnetic properties showed that the Néel temperatures of the ball-milled powder and the ultrafine-grained bulk of Mn2N0.86 compound are drastically reduced as compared with the coarse-grained polycrystalline ζ-phase Mn-N compounds. Furthermore, it was found that the antiferromagnetism and the weak ferromagnetism coexist in the ball-milled powder and the ultrafine-grained bulk of Mn2N0.86 compound.