Crystal-field study of magnetization and specific heat properties of frustrated pyrochlore Pr2Zr2O7

• Full CF diagonalization using intermediate coupling and J-mixing.
• Pr-spins are Ising-like along local [111] axis.
• Magnetic specific heat is due to temperature dependence exchange splitting of ground CF doublet.

The experimental results of temperature dependent dc magnetic susceptibility, field dependent isothermal magnetization, magnetic specific heat and entropy of the pyrochlore Pr2Zr2O7 are simulated and analyzed using appropriate D3d crystal-field (CF) and anisotropic molecular field tensors at Pr-sites in the self-consistent mean-field approach involving four magnetically non-equivalent rare-earth spins on the tetrahedral unit of the pyrochlore structure. CF level pattern and wave-functions of the ground 3H4 multiplet of the Pr3+ ions are obtained considering intermediate coupling between different Russell-Saunders terms of the 4f2 electronic configurations of Pr-ion and J-mixing effects. CF analysis shows that the CF ground-state of the Pr3+ ion in Pr2Zr2O7 is a well-isolated doublet, with significant admixtures of terms coming from |MJ=±4〉 and |MJ=±1〉, and the Pr-spins are effectively Ising-like along the local <111> axes. Magnetic specific heat in zero-field is simulated by considering a temperature dependence of the exchange splitting of the ground doublet.