Magnetic structure of the Mn5Si3-type Er5Ge3 compound

The Er5Ge3 compound (Mn5Si3-type, hP16, P63/mcm) at 4 K shows magnetic ordering of the antiferromagnetic type. Its magnetic structure consists of sine modulated collinear magnetic moments of Er that are parallel to the c axis (with a propagation vector k=[0 0 ±0.3]). This corresponds to the magnetic unit cell (a a 10c), the values of the magnetic moment of the Er atoms being, as a general formula, Mz≈M0 cos [2π(Z–1/4)(1–kZ)], with M0=9.2(2) μB at 4 K.