Metamagnetic Behavior and Kondo Breakdown in Heavy-Fermion CeFePO

Abstract

We report that nonmagnetic heavy-fermion (HF) iron oxypnictide CeFePO with two-dimensional XY-type anisotropy shows a metamagnetic behavior at the metamagnetic field H(M)≃4 T perpendicular to the c axis and that a critical behavior is observed around H(M). Although the magnetic character is entirely different from that in other Ce-based HF metamagnets, H(M) in these metamagnets is linearly proportional to the inverse of the effective mass, or to the temperature where the susceptibility shows a peak. This finding suggests that H(M) is a magnetic field breaking the local Kondo singlet, and the critical behavior around H(M) is driven by the Kondo breakdown accompanied by the Fermi-surface instability.