Superconductivity and magnetism in intermetallic Bi3Ni1−xFex superconductor

In this work, we investigated the apparent coexistence of superconductivity and magnetism in polycrystalline Bi3Ni1−xFex samples for low concentrations of iron (0≤x≤0.10). The compound was synthesized by the solid-state reaction method and characterized by X-ray diffraction and magnetic measurements. From X-ray, it was observed that the main phase corresponds to an orthorhombic structure with space group Pnma and shows no dependence on the Fe concentration. From magnetic measurements, it was observed that the critical temperature was not affected by iron doping and that ferromagnetism and superconductivity coexist apparently in an interesting interplay.