Electronic structure and magnetic properties of Fe3C with 3d and 4d impurities

We study the electronic structure, formation energies, and magnetic properties of cementite Fe3C doped by 3d and 4d transition metals (TM) by means of first-principles calculations. All TM elements demonstrate a preference for the substitution of the general iron position in Fe3C. We predict that early elements (Sc, Ti, V, Cr, Zr, and Nb) stabilize the cementite, while the end elements (Ni, Cu, Pd, and Ag) in the TM series sharply destabilize it. The magnetic properties of impurity atoms are found to depend strongly on their atomic numbers and the trends to ferromagnetic or antiferromagnetic coupling of impurities with Fe atoms in Fe3C coincide with the magnetic behavior of these impurities in Fe. The physical reason is a similar location of the Fermi level in the pseudogap of spin-down and almost filled spin-up Fed states in both Fe3C and Fe. (c) 2007 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.