“Magnetic” phase transition in silver

Experimental and theoretical investigations of the magnetic susceptibility near the phase transition into the Condon domain state in silver are presented. We report about the precursor of the Condon instability of an electron gas by using data of the measurement of the magnetic field-dependence of the susceptibility. Experimental results are explained theoretically within the framework of the Lifshitz-Kosevich-Shoenberg theory. A good agreement between the theory and the experiment is obtained when de Haas-van Alphen oscillations are only originated from “belly” oscillations, and as a result of this, the spherical modelling of the Fermi surface in silver is justified. It is shown that the phase transition into the Condon domain state is the critical point of the liquid-gas type at which the isothermal susceptibility does not diverge but possesses a finite value due to the nonzero demagnetization factor.