An appraisal of the crystal field in rare earth intermetallics:: TmCu2Si2

A crystal field (CF) investigation of the proper-ties of Tm3+ in TmCu2Si2 has been done for an appraisal of the CF proposed by Kosaka et al. [J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. 66, 2844 (1997)] from their magnetic studies and inelastic neutron scattering investigation. As these CF parameters were found to give only a qualitative explanation of the observed data, they were refined to have a closer fit to the observed magnetic susceptibility, Stark levels obtained from inelastic neutron scattering studies, and thermal variation of nuclear electric quadrupole splitting. It has been found that molecular field interactions play a dominant role at low temperatures. Other properties investigated theoretically with the help of the refined set of CF parameters are amenable to experimental check.