The electronic structure of rare-earth iron silicide R2Fe3Si5 superconductors
- Institute of Low Temperature and Structure Research, Polish Academy of Sciences, Okólna 2, 50-422 Wrocław, Poland
- Received 23 May 2013
- Revised 14 August 2013
- Accepted 9 October 2013
- Available online 22 October 2013
Abstract
The electronic structures of R2Fe3Si5 (where R = Lu, Tm, Er, Tb, Yb) intermetallics have been calculated from first principles in local-spin density (LSDA) and LSDA+U approaches. The majority of rare-earth iron silicides, except for the heavy-fermion Yb-based compound, exhibit almost equal values of density of states at the Fermi level (EF) as well as very similar Fermi surface topology. The electronic structure around EF in the 235-type Fe-based compounds is completely dominated by the Fe 3d states. Thus the different superconducting properties of some members of the R2Fe3Si5 family are rather related to a presence of local magnetic moments of R-atoms than to electronic-structure features at EF.
