This article is not a review in the conventional sense. Rather, it is a monographic study of the implications of detection in Al-Cu-Fe quasicrystals of the electronic heat capacity contributions associated with the two-level electron excitations. Our aim was to reveal correlations between these contributions, on the one hand, and specific features of electron transport, magnetic susceptibility, Hall-effect, tunnelling and optical spectra, on the other hand. It is shown that the full range of these features can be understood in the framework of the unified conceptual scheme based on two-level electron excitations.
An electron diffraction study is made of a quenched Cr—25 at% Al alloy exhibiting anomalous physical properties. An intensive diffuse scattering, complicated in form, with intensity maxima belonging to the ordered β‐phase (Cr2Al) and the recently observed x‐phase is detected. The diffuse scattering, including intensity maxima from the β‐ und x‐phases, is prone to vanish regularly, namely, the zero‐intensity line is always perpendicular to the reciprocal‐space vector, and this indicates that the scattering arises from transversely polarized “soft” modes. An analysis of the reciprocal lattice of CrAl alloys permits the conclusion that the diffraction picture produced by the x‐phase may be described by the incommensurate ω‐phase known in the literature. The detected structure qualitatively explains anomalies in the physical properties of CrAl alloys.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.