In-plane and out of plane magnetic properties in Ni46Co4Mn38Sb12 ribbons

Magnetic, magnetocaloric, and exchange bias properties have been systematically investigated in Ni46Co4Mn38Sb12 ribbon by applying magnetic field along in-plane (IP) and perpendicular out of plane (OP) to the ribbon plane. From the thermo-magnetization curves, the sharpness of the martensitic transition is observed to be nearly the same for both IP and OP ribbons. The thermomagnetic irreversibility region is found to be larger in the OP ribbon at 500 Oe, indicating that the magnetic anisotropy is larger in this case. The OP ribbon shows the Hopkinson maximum at 500 Oe, both for the field cooled cooled and zero field cooled modes. The magnetization curve for IP ribbon shows a faster approach to saturation, compared to the OP ribbon. Isothermal magnetic entropy change at 50 kOe has been found to be nearly same for both the ribbons. At 5K, the coercivity and exchange bias values are larger for the OP ribbon. Crystallographic texturing of the ribbons and its effect in the easy magnetization direction are found to be the reason behind the differences between the two ribbons. (C) 2013 AIP Publishing LLC.